THE JOURNEY
by megrimeg
Summary: It's been 15 years since Santana and Brittany have seen for the last time, 15 years in which the two women enjoyed, suffered, loved, lived. Neither of them believed that they would never meet again, but fate has a strange way to put things right...
1. Chapter 1

**A/N**: I found this fourth season really tiring, being a Brittana fan, but thanks to feelings that Brittana gave to me over the years, even though I am a little grown, despite everything, despite the unequal treatment, despite the just mentioned moments of a relationship that boiled underground like glowing lava rather than explode in the visibility of episodes, despite there was more skin and more heart and more voice in our writers' pages rather than in scripts' sheets, despite injuries and the uncertainty, despite the inability to understand what's happening and why, I still firmly believe in this story and I believe that the power of a bond goes beyond and remains like a tattoo in all who have been involved, who have enjoyed and suffered. That's why I decided to take all the bad things that have been thrown at us and make them poetry. I hope to be able to express what I want to tell you even if my language is Italian and for that I apologize for the whole mistakes you'll find in the fic.

The story takes place in present day, where the tv characters are all adults and the history we know through the show, the time of the High School, took place 15 years earlier.

THE JOURNEY

CHAPTER 1

Rachel tried not to make any noise, being very careful to push the handle slowly because it did not produce any sound or strange squeaking. She parted the door and stuck her head inside the room. The curtains were closed and the light of day outside was not yet strong enough to penetrate annoying interrupting the sleep of the morning. But the room was dimly lit by the nightlight that came from Pepe's belly, the penguin doll close in Anna's arms. Rachel opened the door and walked in and immediately closed it behind her to let the waking house's sounds and voices out of the room.

Anna didn't like at all be awakened before the sleep slipped away on its own, especially she didn't like that her dreams were interrupted abruptly and the real life swooped down on her like a summer rain; every time this happened she wore the whole morning a long pout all around her face and a mixed expression of anger and frustration with half-closed eyelids over her dark eyes. And Rachel didn't want that the sad face of the child accompanied their last moments together before "The journey". "The journey" ...everyone had started to call it that way... Rachel smiled sadly to herself as she approached Anna's bed. Huddled under the covers, her face illuminated by the nightlight, she seemed so little. Anna was a clever and smart child and when she spoke she thundered with her considerations so that no one had ever ventured into talk to her with that awkward and tiny language with whom normally people talk to children. Anna was direct and honest and she didn't like lies or beating around the bush. Anna wanted real answers when she asked questions. And she realized immediately if any of the adults tried to sweeten the pill. It had happened for the disease too.

But when she didn't speak and especially when she slept, she went back to be that minute five years old wren, with round cheeks and black hair and the beholders could not help but want to hug her and cover her with kisses. Or at least that was how Rachel felt. She knelt next to the edge of the bed and with one hand she moved Anna's hair that covered her cheek. Anna wrinkled her nose in her sleep. Rachel put her mouth to the child's ear and called:

"Hey chestnut..."

Her words were a breath and if her lips weren't so close to the girl's ear Anna would never have heard 'em. But she heard instead and this time she wrinkled both nose and lips and Rachel knew it wasn't a good sign so she added whispering this time:

"Papi is churning out muffins..."

Yes, that was how they decided to buy her, with a batch of chocolate muffins; they had already planned out all the day before because they knew she would never put a grudge if they offered her a warm muffin. She smiled but didn't open her eyes. Rachel breathed a sigh of relief, the mission: Do not pout Anna! was successfully accomplished.

Rachel went to Anna's cheek and kissed her lightly.

"I know you're awake. I can feel your belly screaming 'Muffin! Muffin!' "

Anna let out a chuckle and then pulled out both arms from under the covers, dropping the penguin Pepe to the ground, and reached for Rachel closing her tiny arms behind the woman's neck and pulling her. Rachel abandoned herself completely to the child's hug and buried her face in the pillow, over Anna's shoulders where her soft and black hair were scattered, breathing in her scent. Rachel's eyes filled with tears, she really was in danger of losing her forever?

"Good morning aunt Rach!"

She muttered with a tickly voice and Rachel drove away the thoughts that just climbed to her mind trying to send back the tears. She sniffed and strayed from the pillow until she faced Anna and looked straight in her eyes.

"Good morning to you chestnut...ready for breakfast?"

"Twins are already awake?"

"Not yet, if you want we can go to wake them up, so we can have breakfast all together!"

Anna didn't answer, but a huge smile appeared and cut in half her face and then she sat helping herself with her arms. Rachel held her taking her behind her back. "Want me to take you?"

"No, I can do by myself."

Rachel lifted the covers and helped Anna to get out of bed and looked at her: she was walking slowly to the door, being careful not to increase the pace and she was really excited because she already had in mind a couple of jokes to do to her brothers for wake them up, but she knew that her heart beat faster when she woke up and she didn't want let it run even more. Anna learned soon to know her body and to listen to it and she didn't ask to it more that it could give. She was a conscious child and this was really helpful to a bunch of inexperienced adults who had found themselves fighting a silent and unexpected enemy.

"Aren't you coming?" Anna asked.

"Sure chestnut, I'm behind you!" Rachel finally got up from the bed and followed Anna to the twins' bedroom's door.

Gregory and Elliot, unlike Anna, had to be woken up every morning because, being two great sleepers, they would stay in bed forever if they could. Rachel went to wake them up every morning and when Anna was at home, it was like a ritual: Rachel woke up Anna first and together they went to wake the twins who slept rigorously in the same bed, Rachel tried since they were born three years before to let them sleep apart, but she had never been able to. When they were like four month old, they never stopped cry: when she nursed them one at a time, when she cleared them and above all when she put them to sleep, never, they never stopped cry, 'till the day that she realized that by bringing near the two cots, they magically stopped crying. And now every night Rachel put them each in his bed and in the morning she always found them together in the same bed. They were eerily the same, sometimes Anna mistook them, especially when it was long time since she saw them. They had straight brown hair cut in a bob that was never still, two heavy eyebrows of the same color and light brown eyes. Their mouths were small and fleshy and their faces were round and white. The only thing that really distinguished them was the cutting of the eyes, Gregory's one was small and narrow and he had a Finn's like expression, while Elliot's eyes were rounder and sweet.

Now that it was already three days she was at papi's home she knew that Elliot was the one on the right and Gregory was the one on the left.

"Don't be too cruel babe..." Rachel begged her, but Anna was already looking at the two little bodies with a sly look ready to attack. She breathed a huge breath filling her lungs and shouted in the direction of the children!

"Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake!"

Rachel covered her ears!

"Anna!" She scolded her while the 'a' still burst into the room, "You're waking the whole neighborhood!"

Anna started laughing leaning a hand over her beating heart and breathing heavily while the children who heard the scream, stood up to sit but still kept squinting ready to slip back into sleep.

Even Rachel laughed to see her wobbly and not yet fully awake children and in that moment Finn filled the room with an expression that hovered between amusement and concern.

"Anna you must stop doing that!" He scolded her but then he saw his children, and all five started to laugh in unison. Rachel, still laughing, threw herself on the bed and her little children four arms grappled her, as Anna did before, while she tickled them. Rachel didn't believe there could be more beautiful feeling than those arms clinging to her neck. When children hug they do it with strength and conviction, their soft meat and their scented skin shake you crushing and gluing their little bodies to yours enough to take your breath away.

Finn crouched next to Anna and took her in his arms, making their way out of the bedroom speaking to her.

"Would you please do me the great favor to wash your face and put on 'the journey' dress that is on your bedroom's chair?"

"But I'm hungry, I want breakfast first!"

Anna pulled back out her lower lip and Rachel, who was watching them: "That's Finn! Did you see it? My every effort to make the child happy and bubbly as usual instead of wearing that sad look and that huge manifestation of disappointment has been shattered for your primal fear of upsetting her mother in some way. Stretch your nerves and bring your daughter to eat breakfast!"

"Come on papi!" And then she smiled, raising her eyebrows and Finn knew that, with that look, Anna would make him do anything in the world, as stupid or senseless. He rolled his eyes. "Ok!"

"The male gender...! A pair of sweet eyes and they are already slaves!"

Anna giggled because she knew that what Rachel just said was the real true.

"I wanna eat too!" Elliot almost shouted into his mother's ear.

"Ok quail egg, anything you want!"

"Me too!" Gregory echoed.

"Ok plum anything you want too!"

"Ah, women, a request by a son and they are already slaves!" Finn mimicked his wife's words while Anna laughed again because his father was right too.

"Anna I eat everything!" Elliot screamed and jumped from his mother's arms all the way down from the bed and ran to the door and then down through the hall and then, when he came to the stairs, he stopped clinging to the railing and helping down one step at a time. It was in that moment that all the others took advantage to reach him.

"Don't count on it midget! Come on papi hurry up!"

Anna screamed still in Finn's arms.

"He's right! Elli eats everything! And you nothing!" Gregory laughed in Rachel's arms and among laughter the five went down to the kitchen where the smell of hot chocolate muffins made Anna's belly grumble.

They breakfasted laughing, Anna's face was completely smeared with chocolate and Finn looked worried repeatedly checking his watch. It was twenty minutes to nine now and Finn's nervousness grew more and more: Anna was in her pajamas and had a dirty face from ear to ear!

"Oh Finn you're being ridiculous! Come on chestnut, let's go and get changed before father consume that watch with his eyes! And you Finn take care of the twins!"

Anna laughed and squeezed Rachel's hands who helped her to get out of the chair and together they walked upstairs. The twins meanwhile had gone somewhere in the house to play something that was definitely forbidden for them, which made it even more difficult the task Rachel had entrusted to her husband. Finn shrugged with a sigh and started to call his children.

"Aunt Rach, you know I could die?"

As they climbed the stairs Rachel heard those words coming from the girl's mouth and almost stumbled risking to fall behind and to take the child in her fall. She stopped turning to her without any word because she knew that Anna was right and she knew that whatever stupid answer she had given to Anna, she would not have accepted it. There was a moment of silence in which Rachel tried to find the right words to say, but couldn't find them and shook Anna's hand taking up the stairs, as she heard Finn's and her children's shouting. When they entered in her bedroom Anna spoke again. "I didn't want to make you sad!"

"Oh honey I'm not sad."

"Yes, you are." Anna's eyes slipped as blades in Rachel's and then sank into her throat and straight to the heart.

"What's after? I mean, if I were to die, what there would be for me, after?"

And Rachel dropped in bed and couldn't hold back the tears. They started to slip from her eyes without any control, as when the sun arrives at the end of the winter consuming the snow and loosening it in water that starts to flow silent and fearless.

Anna walked over to her and hugged her. "I can't ask mom, I know that she would be too hurt and even dad, if it hurts you too, I don't know who I can ask it to!"

Rachel felt that Anna was on the verge of tears and scared and resigned. In the last two years she had been in and out of hospitals so many times that now she could well face her disease, but death was a completely different kettle of fish.

Rachel's heart shook; why life was sometimes so cruel? Why that child had to suffer all this? Her mind tried to find comfort in remembering the first time she had held her: that moment she had become her chestnut, because she was tiny and wrapped in a brown blanket that warmed her entirely, leaving at the mercy of her adoring gaze only the little round and red face and the veiled and dark eyes and the parted lips... a chestnut. It had been only a few tens of minutes since she had come to the world, and a year of doubts and second thoughts and feelings of guilt and expectations and fears and illusions and revelations and arguments... but when she had looked at her for the first time she had known everything was worth it, she had known that the little girl who had nothing to do with her was becoming one of the most important things in her life and she had known that she loved her and that she would have loved her every moment. And now she was in her arms asking her what was after and Rachel would rather jump out of a plane at 10,000 feet high rather than having to hear and answer that question, but she forced herself and pushed her away from her embrace holding her tightly by her arms and with one hand removed her muffin crumbs off her face.

"You know, you can ask me anything and I don't know my chestnut, I don't know what will be after ... next ... well, there are people who believe that our souls will reincarnate in another body, which a bit scares me because who else could hold my soul, but my little perfect body? Not another body, another could not contain the energy that my soul radiates, can you imagine if I would reincarnate in a fat slimy contractor of Kansas?"

Rachel allowed a smile to appear on her lips and Anna mirror her.

"Then there are those who believe that ghosts remain close to their family to protect them and make their jokes every now and then! And how much I'd like to stay close to your mother and make fun of her for the rest of her life! Then there are those who believe that our souls go to heaven to sing with the angels, but poor angels, if I had to end up singing with them I would put them in the shade with my incredible vocal range and I'd steal them many of those solos that before or later they would be forced to kick me out of there!"

Rachel knew she wasn't responding to the question of the girl, but she didn't want her to be sad anymore, she wanted to make her laugh, and if the words were not enough, she began to tickle her sides until, amused by the words and tickling, Anna begged Rachel to stop.

When she calmed down Anna said: "I'm little, but I'm not stupid."

"Me too!" Rachel said back, snatching another laugh to Anna. "You know chestnut, you don't have to worry, many people will take care of you and will make sure that you'll be okay, and I really don't know what's after, maybe there is nothing. I imagine that everything is white and there's so much love and music, but I don't know, no one really knows. But I know what's here and I know that it takes a lot of strength and courage to stay here, and you need to pull them both out a lot more than you have now, to make sure of not having to worry about on what's after. Ok chestnut? "

Anna nodded and Rachel smiled. It took to her a good deal of courage to answer that. Anna smiled back.

"Now you have to change you, before mami arrives, otherwise she won't stop telling me I'm a bad mother and that I don't deserve to take care of you!" Anna laughed heartily.

"You and papi worry too much about mami... she loves you!"

"Yeah, well she really has a strange way of showing it!" And the two laughed as Rachel helped Anna to wash and dress, and meanwhile Finn struggled trying to get on top of his task and believing impossible to deal with the twins together for the morning toilet. The clock went off on 9 and someone rang the bell.

"This is mami!" Anna announced jumping for joy while Finn, who willingly gave up his deliveries to Rachel, finished tie her shoes. From the twins' bedroom Elliot came out running and screaming half-naked.

"I GO, I GO!" The boy rushed into the corridor again, stopping again at the top of the stairs and slowing its descent, followed by Finn and Anna who made fun of him like every holy time the woman stood at the door of Hudson-Berry's house. He arrived first at the door and then waited impatiently for his father to open it, hopping from one foot to the other and grinning excitedly. As soon as the door was opened and Elliot recognized the familiar waves of black hair that fell down soft to the shoulders of the woman turned back, he shouted:

"Santanaaaaaaaa!"

It was then that the woman turned looking straight down at the little screaming boy who ran grabbing her legs and she couldn't help but stretch her arms under his armpits and hold him letting the child's short arms, that much resembled Rachel, tighten her. But her eyes went down to Anna who was waving her and was giving the most beautiful smile she had ever seen. Santana smiled back, she knelt and waited for Anna to approach her and embrace her, and so she found herself trapped in the heat of the two little bodies and she knew that in a few moments they would start to fight, like any holy time, over who should cuddle the woman.

"Hey, I'm enough for both of you!" She exclaimed as a subtle whisper came from her daughter's lips pressed in her shoulders, a word _Mami_ that tickled the sensitive skin between shoulders and neck and made her tremble with happiness and peace.

And then she waved at Finn who smiled back trying to rip Elliot, who had to finish dressing, from her arms. Elliot groaned but then let go of the grip and let his father take him away. Santana so picked up her daughter and together they entered in the house, closing the door behind them.

"Buenos dias mi hija!" (_"Good morning my baby!"_)

"Hola mami ... ¿cómo has estado sin mí en estos días?" (_"Hi mami… How have you been without me these days?"_)

Santana smiled and shook her head "... lo peor, mi vida! I missed you so much!" (_"…the worst, my life! I missed you so much!"_) And they laughed together holding each other. Santana gave a blind eye to her right and saw the suitcases perfectly aligned: behind Finn's and in front Anna's. "They've done their homework..." Santana let it out and raised an eyebrow grinning to herself.

"No ser mala con ellos!" (_"Don't be mean with them!"_)

Anna scolded pointing straight towards her nose. "No soy mala, pero me encanta mucho cuando hacen exactamente lo que les pregunto para evitar que me enfado!" (_"I'm not mean but I really like it when they do exactly what I ask them to prevent me to get angry"_)

And then she opened her mouth to her daughter's pointing finger snapping its jaws as if she wanted to eat it, which made Anna retract her finger super quickly pressing her hand to her chest and stare opening her mouth in an "o" of surprise, before she started laughing and they laughed together and hugged and cuddled until Rachel showed taking the twins to hand and Elliot clung back to Santana's legs.

"No one can do without me, do you Berry?"

Rachel rolled her eyes and shook Santana in a tight hug. Then they looked into their eyes. "You have to go, otherwise you will be late!"

Santana's smile faded immediately and a shadow crossed her dark eyes, the ghost of "The journey" touched every corner of her body, in and outside, in an endless thrill and she knew that she could crack at that really moment but Rachel held her gaze because more than anything she wanted Santana remembered that she was not alone, that everyone was there with her to support and help and hold her hand no matter what was going to happen. Rachel told her all this with her eyes while Anna looked puzzled at the two women, but thinking that despite all she was a very lucky girl. Santana nodded.

"I know Rachel." And she got down her daughter and asked her to go get her jacket, while Finn reached the group and hurtled to hug Santana. "Everything's ok, see?"

"Ok Hudson, I grant you, great job this time!"

"Oh how nice you two! Try to stay in this mood for the next two months and everything will be fine!" Rachel said to them then they said their goodbyes. Anna looked at her family say goodbye as if it were the last time they saw each other. She knew she had caused a lot of grief to them all. Not that it was her fault, when one gets sick is not anyone's fault, but mami had stopped working for her and papi couldn't be on stage this year, Rachel and papi had had a fight and the twins wouldn't see their dad for... She didn't know how long. She wasn't afraid, not yet, she was accustomed to go to hospitals, the fact that the hospital was so far this time excited her more than scared. Rachel and Finn kissed for a long time until Santana spat some insult in which was contained the word "Finchel" and the word "disgusting" and Anna couldn't remember in which order because she was busy to scold her mother who as always tried to be the badass. Then Anna hugged Elliot and Gregory and Rachel, and then Rachel hugged Santana and Santana hugged Gregory and then Elliot threw himself weeping into Santana's arms because he didn't understand why she was already going away without his dose of cuddling and then Finn hugged his children and Anna hugged Rachel again and it was then that Santana looked up at the sky and rolled one "Stop immediately with all these hugs 'cause I'm turning into a hideous pink namby-pamby teddy bear!" and then Anna, Finn and Santana got into the car.

Santana sank into the passenger seat while Finn opened the trunk of Santana's car to load his luggage and Anna's trolley. "Where am I supposed to put my bags? You occupied the whole space with yours Lopez! What have you brought?"

"Good mood honey, good mood!" Rachel yelled from the door thinking that those two wouldn't have survived together for two months. Finn grunted something unintelligible and smiled to himself and to his wife, then jammed Anna's trolley in the trunk and placed his two suitcases in the back seat next to Anna, ensuring that the girl had put the seat belt.

Then he went to the guide, giving a last look to his family who greeted him vigorously with tears on their faces.

Santana sighed. Throughout the weekend, while her daughter was at Finn's, she tried to stay busy, there was a lot of things to do before leaving: passports, visas, permits, tickets, plane's and train's and coach's schedules, clean the house, call her parents, last deliveries at work, confirm their arrival at the hospital, but the thing that most of all allowed her to not think about "The journey" was the pack up, what the hell she was supposed to bring? She had not ever been away for two months. Yes, there has been college, and then when she has moved to New York, and then the new house after Anna's birth, but those were real moving, what should she bring for a two-month trip? What can happen in two months? She knew that she was going to spend most of the time in a hospital, and so most of the clothes should be comfortable and then what to bring, formal clothes? Evening dresses? Here again her mind did its best to not think about where they were going and why. At the end she had filled four suitcases full of all she could put inside and she did the same for her daughter's stuff. Once finished the flow of thoughts, her heart began to beat faster and a vertigo shook Santana's head and she closed her eyes feeling a retch rising from her stomach.

"Hey? Are you okay? " Finn asked, realizing the mood in which the woman had fallen at his side.

Santana's eyes widened and then narrowed them angry. "No, Hudson, nothing's okay or maybe you didn't realize it yet?"

"Mami! ¿Estais peleando?" (_"Mami, are you fighting?"_) Anna yelled from the back seat and Finn and Santana spoke simultaneously to their daughter, Finn muttering that they shouldn't speak Spanish in his presence, Santana reassuring her that they weren't arguing.

"I'm sorry ..." Santana apologized.

"Hey ..." Echoed Finn, but before both of them were allowed to go back to the millions thoughts that were in their head, Anna asked them to sing and they spent the drive to the airport singing childish songs. Santana let the music and their voices to reassure her a bit, and calm her down at least for the moment. She had promised herself, she had sworn herself that she wouldn't collapse, not yet, not before the surgery and not in front of Anna. Afterward she didn't know, she knew nothing about afterwards, like Anna, the uncertainty of afterwards was devouring her. Parents should make plans for their children, have expectations, imagine their future and then be disappointed and glad that they have failed their expectations and have lived their own lives. It had been so for her in the first four years of Anna's life, and then the disease arrived and also treatments and hospitals and the knowledge that without the surgery Anna risked a lot. And the knowledge that open heart surgery was as risky. So Santana has stopped making plans and that surgery had become the point of arrival for their lives. After? The afterwards didn't exist, there was not even a vacuum to fill, there was the absence of all, there was nothing like when you're faced with something so scary and you hold your breath to stop time and don't let it and fear overwhelm you, so she had been holding her breath for almost two years and didn't even want to let be comforted by the hope that everything was going well and without complications. The only thing she knew was that damn surgery. After, they all might have begun to breathe again.


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

"Brittanyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy"

Bryan shouted from the vestibule leaning out from the bottom of the stairs, dragging the name as long as he could to let her hear perfectly his voice, this time.

"Sto scendendo!" (_"I'm coming down!"_)

She yelled back but, hearing her, Bryan knew that she still needed some more time to come down and that he would have to wait again: she was clearly brushing her teeth because her voice came out full and dirty while the water ran in the pipes that passed right next to his shoulder into the wall on which he was leaning.

"Mi farai fare tardi anche stamani!" (_"I'll be late this morning too, because of you!"_)

He muttered, raising his voice to be heard. Still it was not late, but he knew that after the teeth the woman had to wash her face, put on her makeup, combing her hair and he wondered if she was already dressed or she was wearing her pajamas yet.

"We are never late! Five minute it's not late!"

"Posso andare con Eleonora in treno? O con mio zio?" (_"I can go with Eleonora, by train? Or with my uncle?"_)

It was not a request, it was a suggestion, but he knew that she wouldn't let someone else drive him, especially his uncle, it was kind of an act of pride not get help from anyone, even if Bryan knew that when he was a boy, many had helped her, especially his family. He had only suggested it to make sure that she would hurry.

"No, no, sto arrivando!" (_"No, no, I'm coming!"_) she said again from the top of the stairs and this time her voice was clear as ever and funny in her strange Italian with that American accent which, even after all these years, it wasn't decreased and softened her "r" and rounded her vowels. "I'm already in the car!"

Bryan looked up the stairs and saw the woman's back as she flew out of her bedroom and ran, wearing only jeans and a bra, to her sitting room. She still had to get dressed. Bryan sighed, taking off the backpack from his shoulders and sat as comfortable as he could on the second step. He rummaged in the backpack's front pocket and pulled out his iPod. The sun was rising, but it was still dark in the house, the front door glass let him glimpse a side of the road illuminated from the orange of street lights still lit. The vestibule was quiet and cold, thick stone walls had kept the heat until it was possible for them, to surrender then ruinous to the cold of the night without heating. The doors facing the vestibule were all closed, the dining room's, the living rooms's and the basement's, only the kitchen's door was open and there was still the smell of the breakfast's milk and coffee that they consumed together just before. Since he could remember, the two had always had breakfast together. In fact there were times Brittany worked till late night and didn't wake up to have breakfast with him the following morning, but every time this happened Brittany set the table for him with all sorts of pastries and biscuits, jams and chocolates and a card with a message that always ended with 'Good morning, amore mio!' (_'Good morning, my love!'_) and for him it was like having breakfast together. Bryan unrolled the headphones rolled around the iPod and stuck them in his ears previously turning attention upstairs and hearing drawers open in a hasty and inelegant manner. He sighed again and, turning on the device, he let the music relax him trying not to think to the resignation that he felt every morning he tried in vain to let his mother out of their house in time.

One day she would turned him crazy. Maybe he was already crazy and didn't realized it. He remembered once, he was about six or seven. It was Sunday and Bryan had an important soccer match: the coach had just promoted him as one of the essential team members and that day was the first time he played; he hadn't to play the whole game, only a few unspecified minutes of the first half of the match, but it was his first match ever played and not watched from the bench. Bryan was thrilled and talked about it and nothing else, since the previous Monday, he had forced his granny to wash and iron his soccer uniform, his grandpa to clean his shoes which were already immaculate, and both his grandparents had driven him to the soccer field. The only thing Brittany had to do was to show up before the whistle blow as soon as she finished work and cheer for him.

But the referee had whistled and she wasn't there, his team had made the first goal and she wasn't there, Bryan had started to play and she wasn't there, he had made his first winning pass and she wasn't there, they had announced the end of the first half of the game and she hadn't arrived yet. Bryan was furious, he was convinced that she had forgotten the most important game of his life, he would never forgive her, he would never again look into her eyes. The tears had started to sting his eyes' corners and his lips had bent in a grimace of disgust and offense, but he hadn't cried, because he was the man of the house and men don't cry. And as he was thinking about what he would do to avenge her absence, here she was walking through the locker room's fire door, running and jumping as if there were coals of fire under her feet, with her shining wonderfully blue eyes and a childish smile that lit up her face.

"You have to come with me Bry!"

She had rushed at him and pulled him by the arm.

"Ora? Dove?" (_"Now? Where?"_)

"You have to come, it's a surprise!"

"No! È la mia partita, non voglio venire con te! No!" (_No! It's my match, I don't want to come with you! No!"_) and then he had whispered, "Non c'eri quando ho giocato…" (_"You weren't there when I played..."_) this time a tear had come out of his eyes, but Bryan had hastened to wipe it with his clenched fist and had sniffed. He had felt the eyes of the other children on him while the anger towards Brittany was growing. It wasn't the first time he had been ashamed of her. Perhaps it was for this reason that he never wanted to speak English in public. He didn't care if his family spoke to him in that language, he didn't want to speak English, he didn't want to seem strange. He had crossed his arms over his chest showing with his body all the feelings he hid inside. But she had knelt down and had forced him to lift his arms, taking his small hands in her giants one and she had looked at him in the eyes.

"I'm sorry honey, I wasn't here for the match. I didn't see you playing, I'm really, truly, deeply, sorry. But there'll be many more matches and I'll be there for all of those. I swear I didn't forget this time, but on my way here I passed in front of the Feltrinelli bookshop and... you have to come with me, trust me it's better than that match, I promise!"

Her eyes were still shining, and his grandfather had appeared at the locker room's fire door and had smiled at him. Bryan knew, as he had always known that he could never say no to that woman, or be angry with her, he loved her more than anything in whole world.

"Yay!"

She had shouted seeing the features of the child soften.

"Change yourself, I'm going to talk to the coach!"

And she had come out trotting again and his granddad had approached him and told him the most real of all things, the one he still repeated in his head every day.

At the end Brittany had brought him to a downtown bar where he had met Elisabetta Dami, the writer of the legendary books of Geronimo Stilton, the journalist mouse, favorite Bryan's books, those he swallowed as if they were water. The writer had just come from a meeting she had with readers in a downtown bookshop and Brittany, he didn't know how, had convinced her to wait and meet a little blond Italian-American boy who had lost the meeting to play five stupid minutes of an important soccer match! He had talked to her and made her a lot of questions about the mouse and suggested her a couple of stories which she could write of one day. The writer had autographed a copy of "Lo strano caso del vulcano puzzifero" he had in his soccer bag (he always carried a book with him) and had given him a Geronimo puppet. So the best day of his life, instead of being ruined, had become even more special and his anger had disappeared completely and his love for Brittany had tripled if this was possible.

His granddad's words bounced in his head, while the slow chords of "The great gig in the sky" vibrated in his ears and his right hand's fingers drummed in time as if he was in front of the black and white of his piano.

"Don't be mad!" his granddad had told him, sitting down next to him in that locker room bench.

"Non sono arrabbiato!" (_"I'm not mad!"_) He had replied, but he was! He was mad, he was angry because he could never say no to her! His grandfather seemed to understand his torment and had continued "We've all been through this, we are always through this, it's her, and she's not easy but she's amazing and you can't help but love her!"

And it was true and still today, that eight years had passed since that day, it was still true, that woman was the strangest, the most annoying, the most nerve-racking, the most lovable, brilliant, amazing mother in the world.

Brittany hopped down the stairs and hit Bryan with the outside of his left foot. The boy awoke from his trance of memories and music. And he looked up at the woman as she continued her descent and rushed to the front door making persistent signs with her hand inviting him to get up the stairs. He took off his headphones to hear a "What are you doing sitting there, move! You're always late!" get out of his mother's amused mouth, who was as usual making fun of him. Brittany laughed and opened the door, letting in the the bitter cold of a December morning in the vestibule. Brittany tightened her jacket and hid her chin and lips in the fuchsia scarf wrapped around her neck. Long blond hair hung down over her shoulders and the wind moved them in shivering waves. She hurried to cover her head with one of her ridiculous hats, handmade by Prudenzia, the old woman who lived down the street, orange with a green duck embroidered on the left side. Bryan rolled his eyes pulling his butt from the pavement and walked over to his mother. "That hat is ridiculous!" he said looking out of the corner of his eyes as he passed her and walked out the door, clutching himself in the shoulders to ward off the cold. "Shut up BoringBoy!" his mother chuckled closing the door behind them and with a stroke she overtook his son and slipped into the car. She blew the horn to warn the boy that it was late and he had to move, but then she remembered it was only six fiftyfour in the morning and that their neighbors would not have enjoyed her continuing to make all that noise, especially Luciana, she would surely make her pay it to her in some way. Brittany laughed thinking about her friend. Bryan finally went into the car and stuck to the seat, pushing back the iPod headphones in his ears.

"No, honey, rules are rules, no alone music in the car!"

Bryan snorted and before her mother's fingers reached his headphones' wires, he quickly took off them by himself and turned on the car's radio. Brittany smiled at her teenage child who pretended, like every morning, not to enjoy her presence. She started the car and left the driveway entering the main road. The winter had arrived, she felt it in her bones and saw it in the nature that turned around her. She loved this place from the first day she had set foot and she got to know it and feel it hers over the years. It was not easy at first, it was all so strange there: people, nature, houses, quite different from what she had ever seen. She had to get used to the noise of tractors going up to the vineyards at dawn, to women's voices who spoke at each other screaming from the windows, to the always open doors and to the pleasant intrusion of neighbors at any time of the day, to the roast chicken's smell on Sunday morning, to the taste of olive oil and wine, to the winter snow and the sweltering heat of summer, to the endless sky that could be seen from the highest point of the hill, to the sun that went down in front of her bedroom's window lighting the hills every night in a different way, to the rotation of crops, to the yellow sunflowers. Now she loved all of this with an almost maternal devotion and she felt lucky and blessed.

"What are we doing tonight?"

She asked as the hill found its end and the road led into the state road following the mild curves of the Arno Valley's plain. The car now was warm and Bryan opened his jacket and took off the hat from his mother's head.

"Nothing mom it's Tuesday! I've got school tomorrow, you know! "

"BoringBoy!"

Brittany pout and for a moment she lost the joy that everyday traveled her veins' lines.

"Do not call me that!" Bryan scolded her.

"You called me Brittany!" She turned, glancing to challenge the boy.

"It's your name..." Bryan took up the challenge grinning in his mother's direction.

Bryan knew that she didn't like being called by name: she was his mother and wanted to be called "mom" like all mothers of this world want, but when he was little he started call her Brittany whenever he was upset with her, in the tone in which his grandparents came to her whenever she did something foolish. And so he continued to do that and when he was upset with her, he called her Brittany.

"Movie and hamburgers on the couch?" Bryan looked at her, trying to think of what he had to do that night. He had just started the day and didn't want to think already at its end. Wednesday morning, history test. He would spend the afternoon studying, perhaps a little distraction with his mom would be good. But he took some time to answer so Brittany pushed on "Come on honey you pass all weekends with your friends and your girlfriend, you have no more time for me!" The woman emphasized the word "girlfriend" conscious of the reaction that would lead to the child and hence chuckled and raised her eyebrows finishing the sentence.

"Eleonora's not my girlfriend! How many time do I have to remind you!"

Brittany crossed the toll-booth slowing "I know Bry! I like joking, you know!" And leaned smacking a kiss on his child's head who gladly accepted it. "...and sure she's not your girlfriend, it's me your only love! And you'll never love someone else like you love me!" and laughed heartily.

"Mom it's a really bad thing to tell to your teen son!" Bryan wrinkled his nose.

"I know!" She said between laughter and Bryan immediately mimic her and the car was filled with their cackles.

They remained a bit in silence as the sound of laughter was still ringing in their ears. The highway ran fast and even Brittany with her, overtaking the trucks that populated it in abundance at that time of morning.

When the road sign pointed to the exit "Firenze Sud" Brittany entered the deceleration lane and then left the highway.

Florence was still dozing. Not the cars; the roads entering the city swarmed with vehicles of all sizes and colors running or parked next to the sidewalk in a noisy and smelly carnival, but if you looked over, across the street, shops were still closed and shutters were half open to pass the parcels of daily supplies and stevedores and shopkeepers were standing side by side in a weary silence, giving themselves glances of complicity and understanding.

There were mothers with hands clasped on their children's, lost in the memory of some dream just experienced, who pulled them to the nearby school. There were machines that cleaned the streets and builders on construction sites with a thermos of coffee in one hand and small plastic cups in the other who delayed the inevitable start of work.

Brittany stopped at a traffic light.

"Oh oh, listen!"

On the radio they were passing a song by Elisa. Brittany loved that singer, she was one of the few Italian singer who sang in English and it made her fell somehow understood, like her that singer was a bit here and a little there.

"_And __I'm lost __like a __bottle __that __floats __in the sea __for ever__/__Will __somebody __pick __up my __hope__? __/__Will __somebody __try__? __/__Will I __realize__?_"

Bryan looked at his mother as she sang not only with her voice, but with her whole body, moving her shoulders, waving her head to the music and as they were stopped at traffic lights she kept her hands clasped in a fist in front of her mouth simulating a microphone with her eyes closed. Every time he saw her mother surrendering to the music like that, singing, and dancing above all, Bryan could feel the grandeur of her energy. His mother was energizing, she was like a glass of water after a climb. But when she sang she always kept her eyes closed, as a reflex, and Bryan was convinced that she did it to hide her eyes. Sometimes he felt stupid thinking this, he didn't have an explanation, but it seemed to him that when she sang her eyes turned darker, deeper and nostalgic.

The horn of the car behind them signaled to Brittany that the light had turned green and the queue had started to move and so did she but stopped after a few meters because it was red again.

"Come on Bry sing with me, you liked this song, we always sang it when you were a child!"

And Bryan started to sing followed by a surprised Brittany who didn't believe her son wanted to sing along with her.

"_'__cause it's __broken broken__/ Something __got __broken __like __stolen__/__Stolen__, __like __if __it __was stolen__/ And __hurting__, __hurting__/__I have been __hurting __and __now /__Only time __will tell__/__Time will __heal"_

The music flowed and even cars next to her followed their course in the opposite direction and it was a moment, a car stood next to her window to let a woman with a stroller cross the road. There was a little girl in that car's back seat, dark eyes, olive skin, stuck to the rear window, dark eyes, she was smiling to her and when she saw that Brittany was looking her, she pressed her lips to the glass and blew letting puff up her cheeks. Brittany laughed and stared into her dark eyes. Her heart did a strange jump in her chest, she could have sworn that those dark eyes… but the car drove off and Bryan called out "Mom you're not singing!"

The lights snapped back to green and Brittany started to drive the car and resumed to sing with the image of those dark eyes in her head that faded slowly as the city gulped her down its routine. "_Still I can get back on my feet and walk on / As I know there was something to learn / I know there will always be more worth moving on for / Though, it's broken broken / Something got broken like stolen / Stolen, like if it was stolen / And hurting hurting / I have been hurting and now / Only time will tell…_"

When they arrived in front of the Music High School the image of that dark eyed little girl was already lost in her memories. Bryan opened the door and waved his classmate who was waiting him at the school's entrance gate. Before leaving he turned to his mother. "So movie and hamburgers on the couch, tonight?"

Brittany explode a pure happiness smile and nodded vehemently. "See you later BoringBoy!" and threw him a kiss while Bryan got out and slammed the door and greeted her from outside with a "Ciao Brittany!" put out his tongue and when he turned his head, his mother no longer existed, there were only his friends and teachers and Eleonora who meanwhile had joined his classmate and was waiting for him in front of the gate.

Brittany gave a last look at the boy. He had really grown. Sometimes it didn't seem possible to her that he was already fourteen. She was a child when he was born. Or at least it was how she felt at that time. Her parents' reproaches were not enough, the move was not enough, the pregnancy was not enough to make her grow, but then Bryan came. She had given birth alone, those days she had again fought with her parents, she had created her son in another continent, in a place she still didn't feel hers, with even vivid and sharp images of her former life, the life which she would never come back to, she had become a mother in the uncertainty of her future, and in that moment, when she had held him in her arms for the first time, that future which she had never thought to, which she had never given importance to, had become the only thing she could think of. At that right moment she had become important because from then on she would have had to teach to that little human being how to live. She had cried that day, she had wept until she had no more tears, letting them streaming down her cheeks and some in her child's head. That day she had said goodbye to the naive little girl she was before. She would have been better. She had promised it to the future who was whimpering and looking at her without really seeing her. She would have been better for him and for herself.

She took the second exit off the traffic circle and swung in the car park. She glanced at the clock making sure not to be too late and realized that it was not late at all. Hidden by the trees she saw the children's hospital's light sea green and she felt at home. She parked and walked quickly towards the entrance cordially greeting each person she recognized passing by: patients, doctors, nurses, family members.

Sitting on one of the entrance's colorful chairs Roy was waiting for her pretending disappointment for her not delay. Brittany approached him quickly, the sun was strong that morning and came in through the entrance's glass walls warming people passing by or stood waiting with heat and joy. Roy was already in his white coat that was not white at all, this morning he was wearing the red one with a bunch of yellow and green balloons printed on the back.

"Good morning, Dr. Patrice, ready for the new arrivals?"

"Sei in ritardo anche stamani Brie! E stai parlando in inglese!" (_"You're late this morning Brie, as always! And you're speaking in English!"_)

Roy stood up and put his right hand on Brittany's lower back pushing her to the bar. Brittany loved his friend's French accent and, above all, the French "r" he pronounced in her name. They have known each other for twelve years, he had helped her to learn Italian, a Frenchman who teaches Italian to an American, this thing had always made her laugh, but he had lived in Italy practically for all his life.

"It's not true and you know it!" Brittany giggled seeing the man reciprocated it with a resigned smile on his face. "Sorry, still English!" she muttered to herself and then in an almost perfect Italian "Stamani offri te!" (_"You buy this morning!"_) she approached the counter asking the bartender two espressos. Roy followed her and paid for the coffees muttering that he always had to pay. Brittany laughed 'cause she knew it wasn't really a problem for Roy to buy morning espresso and early afternoon espresso too. It was so, had always been so, since they started working together.

She soon learned the ritual of coffee, in Italy was almost like a religion, the morning one was the most important, it enter into your bowels, in every vein of your body and wakes you up from the night slumber. The after lunch one washes away the taste of the food. These two were those that Brittany gave herself, but Roy could drink as many as six espresso in one day, and even more when he worked the night shift.

With their cups in hand, they sat down at the table and Roy pulled out the list of little long-term patients who had arrived in the last fourteen days in the Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery Department. 19 children in all. Few of these names were highlighted in yellow. Brittany gave an absent-minded look at the list as she opened the bag of sugar and poured it into the cup entirely.  
"How many do you have today?" Roy raised an eyebrow and looked at her "Sorry again! Quanti ne hai oggi?"

"Soltanto 3!" (_"Just 3!"_) Roy replied ironically passing a hand in his forehead "Grazie al cielo! Lo sai che non mi piace affatto parlare con i genitori, sono un chirurgo, sono bravo con le mani, non con le parole! Oh, e poi due di questi sono stranieri!" (_"Thank goodness! You know I do not like to talk to parents, I'm a surgeon, I'm good with my hands, not with words! Oh, and then two of them are foreigners!"_) He slid a finger looking for the three children's names hospitalized on this day by checking their provenance.

"Uno è spagnolo, l'altra Americana. Ah già, come se non bastasse, la bambina americana è figlia di un qualche musicista di una famosa band, non poteva essere peggio di così!" (_"One is Spanish, the other American. Oh yeah, as if that were not enough, the American girl is the daughter of some famous musician in a famous band, it couldn't be worse than that!"_)

Brittany raised her eyebrows and smiled to his friend, "Perchè?" (_"Why?"_) she asked. It wasn't the first time Roy complained of VIP's children.

"Perché le persone famose sono le peggiori, pretendono un sacco di stupide cose e credono che solo i loro figli siano importanti in questo mondo e si aspettano che i loro figli vengano prima di tutti gli altri!" (_"Because famous people are the worst, they pretend a lot of stupid things and believe that only their children are important in this world and expect us to take care of their children before everyone else!"_)

Brittany shook amused her head, as she spun the spoon inside the cup melting sugar and having fun from the ringing of the spoon tapping in the ceramic, Bryan hated it when she did it. "Vuoi andare te a parlare con loro? Alcuni sono anche americani, di sicuro loro capirebbero meglio te di me col mio franco-italo-inglese!" (_"You want to go talk to them? Some are even Americans, for sure they understand you better than me with my French-Italian-English!"_)

"Oh no no no!" Brittany raised both index and shook them in front of his face, "Io lavoro solo con i bambini, niente adulti!" (_"I only work with the kids, no adults!"_)

"Perché sei diventata rossa?" (_"Why you're blushing?"_)

Brittany, visibly blushing, covered her cheeks with her hands and laughed with him at her inability to deal with adults. Then she took the cup of espresso, spun another couple of times and drank the contents in two gulps. The liquid came down powerful and velvety into her stomach and a line of it streamed in her lower lip; Brittany slipped it between her teeth and licked cleaning it. "Dunque come al solito, veniamo a prendere i bambini e li portiamo qui. Immagino che tu non ci sarai oggi?" (_"So as usual, we come to pick up the kids and bring them here. I guess you will not be there today?"_) she let escape a laugh winking to her friend. "No, mentre voi sarete qui a divertirvi, io mostrerò le mie innate doti linguistiche ai genitori dei nuovi ricoverati!" (_"No, while you have fun here, I'll show my innate language skills to __new __hospitalized's _parents!") He shook his head, drank his coffee in one gulp and stood up, taking Brittany's arm and pulling her up with him. "Andiamo va!" (_"Come on!"_)

The two walked to the nearby elevator that would take them to the cardiology department.

"Gli altri sono già arrivati?" (_"The others have already arrived?"_) He asked.

"Si, Sara mi ha appena mandato un messaggio dicendomi che sono già tutti pronti e che io sono in ritardo come al solito!" (_"Yes, Sara has just sent me a text telling me that they __all _are ready and I'm late as usual!")

Roy laughed as Brittany stuck out her tongue and hugged him resting her head on his shoulders and hooking her right arm to his waist. Roy put his left arm around her shoulders in the intimacy of an embrace.

* * *

A/N The song: Elisa "Broken"


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

The hospital lobby was full of light. Santana had an idea of hospitals that didn't reflect at all what she was seeing now. Those she had visited with her daughter were in most cases aseptics, impersonals, where cool colors, as shades of blue or pink, prevailed and where white was the main color: white walls, white coats, white blankets and sheets, white gloves, white floors, white towels ... as if colors were to infect the environment just by their presence. Santana had seen a lot of hospitals. She didn't trust. She had never been a confident person in her life at all, she had been always careful and wary, but in those hospitals there was something wrong, she couldn't figure out what, but every first time she brought Anna for a visit to a new hospital, her instinct was to run away and go look for another one. Finn had reproached her countless times, and accused her of being too protective of her daughter and sometimes he had told her she would never find a person to treat Anna. But Santana knew, while admitting to be overprotective with her daughter, that wasn't only that. Those hospitals weren't good at all, she just had to find the right one. And she'd continue to look for the right one until she found it because she would never let her child's chest been opened by people she didn't trust. She closed her eyes and shuddered to that thought, swallowing tears that the thinking of her daughter's chest had pushed up her throat.

Then one Sunday afternoon a few weeks earlier, Santana had driven Anna to Finn's house to spend the weekend, it was an important weekend, that Friday night was Hiram and Leroy's wedding anniversary and Rachel had organized a great party in which practically everyone were invited: Rachel's fathers of course, Carol and Burt, Kurt and Blaine and Quinn, and Anna was so excited to see her grandparents and her uncles, she hadn't seen them for a while now. Finn and Rachel had invited Santana to stay for dinner and Santana had been involved in that pathetic family reunion that had celebrated love all night with sentimental ballads and mawkish aphorisms, and more than once during the evening she had found herself to look at the ceiling in search of a temporary shelter from all that sugar, refraining from letting slip from her tongue some sharp comments. In a moment she had let slip a "Love is just an illusion!" and all evening after her release, Anna had tried to restrain her from saying other stupid things like that looking hard in her eyes to keep her at bay. It wasn't that Santana didn't believe in love, she just didn't believe it was something that belongs to everyone and she thought she had already have her chance to love. Luckily they hadn't forced her to sing that evening, because nostalgia had clung to her sternum like a sucker and she would have surly cried if she had have to sung, she couldn't remember what _to love_ meant. The love she now knew above all else was the immeasurable one for her child, but she knew there was more. Or at least there had been ... a long time earlier ... she just didn't remember how it was. Then Anna had risen in the bedroom with Rachel and the twins to help them prepare for the night and Santana knew that everyone would have pulled out the hospital issue and the surgery issue and she hadn't wait long 'cause Kurt immediately had turned to her.

"So ... I guess you're still considering all the options before making the decision that we are all eager for you to take or is there already a hospital that you like best and that you trust enough to not run away like hell when you see the neon sign outside?"

Santana had looked down and the tension had dropped in the room. Anna had to have surgery and she couldn't wait any longer, Santana would have to make a decision already long ago.

"No, Kurt, I haven't decided yet."

"Good!" He had said.

Good? What good? Why good? "Good?" she had asked.

"I want to show you something." Kurt had tried to explain. He had already caught the attention of all his relatives and when he had pulled out the iPad to set it on the coffee table, everyone had leaned towards it. That night, Kurt had shown them the website of a famous pediatric hospital in Italy, in Florence to be precise. The website explained how they took care of children, of their body and their spirit, in a page there were comments of parents praising the staff, the structure and the wonderful relationship that everybody had with the little patients; and last but not least Kurt had shown how the hospital was specialized in the treatment of rheumatic fever and in mitral commissurotomy. Santana was delighted, she didn't know why, but she knew that that was the right place for Anna; she didn't know why but her heart had begun to beat really fast when Kurt had written the hospital name on Google images: the colors she had seen were red and yellow, in those pictures there were children who were smiling and clowns and actors, doctors and nurses in colored uniforms and rainbow colored blankets for beds, and huge game rooms and concerts and bands and drawings on the walls. Kurt, with a smirk on his lips, had looked at her devouring all the information she could find, and when Santana had noticed that smile she had asked him, "What? What is it? "

"Nothing." He had answered, "I knew this was the right place."

Santana wanted to reply, saying that she had not yet taken any decision, that she had to consider many things, that Italy was too far away and much more things she had in her head, but, like Kurt, she knew it was there where she wanted to bring her daughter. So she had done. In agreement with Finn the day after they had talked with hospital officials, with the head department and with Dr. Robert Patrice who wanted all Anna's documentation and medical examinations; he had studied the case, evaluated it and after some days he had called saying Santana she could take the girl to Italy for further examinations, and the possible surgery. And now she was there, more than 6700 km away from her home in New York City.

The exterior of the hospital was an impressive structure lightened from the three floors' staggered terraces, covered by a light sea green roof that mingled with the green of the trees that surrounded and were integrated with the building.

Inside, the entrance was a large glasshouse with a curved facade supported by wooden arches. The glass was transparent at the bottom and at the top, instead, was covered by photovoltaic cells. Santana looked around fascinated. Finn followed her holding Anna in his arms who, like her mother, turned her eyes in every direction trying to catch every details of the place. Santana pulled out of her purse the instruction sheet that Dr. Patrice had sent them with the hospital's acceptance procedure and the daily schedule. She read it again, even if by now she had learned it by heart: up to the second floor and reach the cardiology department; leave documents and sign some papers; bring Anna in her room; 10:30 let Anna go to the glasshouse (the one where they were now in) with the children's entertainers to watch the "Welcome" performance, as she and Finn would have reached Dr. Patrice's office for a chat. The doctor wanted particularly to explain her and Finn the commitment of the hospital to put the young patients at ease. In fact, every two weeks the department staged a show in which doctors and nurses and other hospital staff performed with actors and entertainers, in front of the new hospitalized patients.

The three of them walked to the elevator to reach the second floor. A strong smell of coffee and a rattle of spoons and cups came from the bar to the left. At their right, glass let to see a large garden and a sculpture of a tree with light sea green leaves and a bird perched on it that had the shape and the blue color of a peacock. Santana distracted herself staring at the bird, while Finn asked her if the direction they were moving was right. Santana didn't answer. That morning Finn was wrong road twice before they could reach the hospital, and she was good and kind, she didn't yell at him, but that didn't mean she wasn't a bit annoyed.

"Mami!" Anna drew Santana's attention forcing her, with only the tone of her voice, to answer Finn. Santana turned her head towards them, who were to her left and said harshly "I know what I'm doing!". Anna sighed annoyed, she didn't like when her mami wasn't nice, it seemed she didn't want to be known by anyone. But she knew her well, and knew she was sweet and caring and always worried about people she loved and among these there was her papi. If only she were not so hardheaded!

Anna gave one last glare at her mami and then she started playing with her papi's chin and Santana turned her gaze in front of her.

The glasshouse was full of people of all kinds and of all ages. It seemed that all mankind had found itself in the entrance of that children's hospital in that Tuesday morning. Men, women, children swarmed in front of her eyes in a swirl of colors and smells and languages. Santana caught the resigned expression of a mother who, sitting on an orange chair was nursing her son while another one bounced around them screaming; she viewed an old man walking with small quick steps with his arms stretched behind his back with his hands clasped on those of an old hunchbacked lady accompanying her in the walk; she watched an Indian boy trying to scratch his head furiously pushing a pencil inside his turban; she noticed a man pushing a stroller furiously moving his gaze to the right and left in search of something unknown; she saw a few feet away, in front of her the backs of an embracing couple walking in the same direction as her. The woman rested her head on the man's shoulder with an arm wrapped on his back and the man had to be a doctor, 'cause he was wearing a red coat with printed on the back a bunch of colorful balloons. The doctor was surrounding the woman's shoulders with one arm and she had long blond hair trapped under it but that fell disordered along her back. She was wearing a long gray jacket and tight jeans with a pair of Timberland. Rolled to her left wrist she had a wool fuchsia scarf that she was clutching with the hand to keep it from falling, but a piece of it was already on the ground and slid into the floor like the train of a bride. Santana laughed at the scene. Instinctively she wanted to go to her and tell her she was dirtying the scarf, but she then thought to mind her own business and enjoyed the sight. There was something about that woman that made her heart beat faster and didn't allow her to look away from her. Maybe it was the scarf that had caught her attention, maybe it was the head resting on the man's shoulder, maybe it was the blond of her hair or the way she was walking, maybe it was her hand holding the doctor's coat. Her eyes drank the image of that woman and a shiver shook her head. She didn't see her face, but she imagined her to be beautiful, or maybe she knew she was beautiful, because for a moment the imagination seemed to become thick, concrete and she shifted her attention to the woman's hand: tendons were tense and bulging veins drew the back of it, she couldn't see her fingers that closed the red fabric of the coat in a fist, but that hand looked just like...

"Mami, papi doesn't want to put me down!"

Again her daughter's voice flung away her thoughts and Santana turned her head toward her and Finn.

"I told her that I'll put her down when we get in the elevator." Finn justified himself.

"But I want to walk now!"

"Hudson, if she wants to get down why you continue to hold her?"

"Lopez! Because you've already pointed out a hundred times that we're late and you know that if I put her down she'll distract herself and will make us lose some more time! "

Santana stroked her daughter's leg dangling beside her. "Listen to papi darling, he'll put you down when we'll be in the elevator!"

"Ugh!" Anna pouted and crossed her arms and buried her head in her father's neck, to raise it immediately checking how far was the elevators and how much she would have to wait and instantly her face lit up again "Here there the elevators, I can get down now!? "

Finn put her down without waiting for the approval of her mother, he couldn't stand when Anna was disappointed, it squeezed his heart. Anna got down and stood in the midst of his parents by taking them by the hand. Santana smiling turned her head back towards the woman who had ravish her eyes, but she wasn't there anymore. She sensed an unlikely feeling of emptiness. She looked around, searching among other head and other bodies and other hands, scanning the floor in search of a piece of fuchsia wool and then she saw her back again, this time to her right, in front of one of the two elevators' door that were opening at that moment. Santana saw the woman broke the embrace: she raised her left arm and with her right hand she tried to retrieve the scarf. Then she stepped into the elevator and Santana smiled again as the doors closed behind the couple.

"Mami can I press the button to call the elevator?"

"Of course, sweetie!" Santana allowed her while Anna left the grip of her parents and approached the wall to push the button. She turned to her parents, smiling and pressing. The elevator doors next to the one that had swallowed the blond woman opened immediately and Anna took a slight step backwards almost frightened. "Did you see? It arrived straightway! "

"You are my magical little girl!" Finn said cheerfully and together they entered the elevator, Finn dragging the daughter's trolley. Santana laughed with them, then a tear, sudden and unexpected, fell from the corner of her eyes. Now they were close, they were there at the hospital and the time that she never wanted to come had arrived. She froze. She had her daughter in front of her smiling and joyful as ever and she knew that in a few days she would have suffered, she would have suffered as Santana had never did and even imagined. How can a mother bear to think of all this? Did she hurt her daughter? Didn't she protect her enough? Didn't she take care of her enough? She felt that all the anxiety and frustration and guilt and pain that she tried to hide were rising to her head. She couldn't move, her head was about to surrender to unconsciousness, but then Finn grabbed her hand and with the other dried her tear. "It's okay! Come on! I'm here, we can do this!" Santana let Finn pull her inside and she dropped into Finn's chest hiding her face to her daughter. Sometimes Santana remembered that she was not alone. Sometimes she remembered that Finn was at her side and suffered just as she did. That was why she chose him and allowed him and begged him to enter into her daughter's life, because she knew without a doubt that he would love her and would protect both. She felt Finn's heart beat heavy on her forehead and the guilt increased: the illness was her fault, everyone had told her that it wasn't so, that she couldn't know or foresee it, that things just happen, but she couldn't get out of her mind that if she had taken care of Anna on time and well, now none of them would be there. She wanted to cry but forced herself not to do it. She was Santana Lopez and she had to continue to keep control, at least until the surgery. Anna hugged her parents' legs and her mother put an hand on her head. She didn't like when her mami was so much worried.

They stayed that way until the ding announced that they reached their floor.

As it was written in the daily schedule they stopped at the reception, signed some paper and then a nurse took them to Anna's room.

"I have to put on my pajamas?" Anna asked the nurse as they approached the room. The woman looked at Santana who repeated the question, but it seemed that she didn't understand what they were asking. The nurse patted the air with the palm of her hand signaling them to wait and opened the bedroom's door let them in and then left. The three entered and Anna, after giving a quick glance at her new room, began to make it hers pulling out her things of the trolley her father had leant over the couch. Pepe first of all, her penguin nightlight, books, action figures, frames with pictures of her family that Rachel had prepared for her, and as she adjusted all her stuff and Finn helped her, Santana, standing on the door jamb, took the time to check and get used to the room. There was a bed against the wall at her right, in a central location next to a nightstand. In front of it there was a desk leaning against the wall at her left, below a window. The desk and the bed and the nightstand were green, while the chair at the desk was orange and the blanket colorful striped white, green, red, yellow and pink. In front of the door, to the right of the bed, there was a white and green sofa bed with pillows of the same colors of the bed blanket. On the walls were shelves full of books and notebooks and colors, a blackboard a mirror and a wardrobe. On the right of the front door another door that presumably led to the bathroom. Santana approached the trolley and pulled out Anna's pajamas and slippers, as she was instructed to bring in the instruction sheet and arranged a little things in the closet.

"Then I'll have to put on my pajamas or not?"

"I don't know Anna, the nurse flew away!" Finn laughed.

"She fled because of us?" Finn laughed even more at the concerned look of her daughter's eyes.

"I don't know, maybe it's just gone to look for someone who can speak English! Or maybe your mami scared her! "

"Ah ah!" Santana answered in a distracted way while she was still looking into the suitcase for cutlery and cups. She looked up only when a young man's voice entered the room.

"Good morning! Do you need my help? "

The nurse had a yellow colored dots scrub. "My name's Marco." The three introduced themselves, "Oh you are Finn Hudson the drummer, it's truly an honor to have you here! I heard you playing last year in Lisbon, when you played for Joe Bonamassa, it was great!"

The nurse was visibly excited, but professional enough not to completely surrender to the enthusiasm of a fan.

"Can I ask him about the pajamas?" Anna asked Santana while the two men talked about drums and clik rim or it was rim shot?

"Of course Anna, but why are you so worried about pajamas?"

"I don't want to wear it yet, it makes me look sick!"

Santana sat on the bed and picked up her daughter giving her a sweet smile. Her heart beat faster again, but she tried to calm down when Anna threw her arms around her neck and buried her nose in her mother's neck sniffing deeply. Santana was afraid that the girl could feel her heartbeat by how close they were.

"You're tasty!" Anna laughed tickling Santana's neck with light puffs of laughter.

"Gracias mi amor!" (_"Thanks my love!"_) Santana said sniffing her back "You too!"

Santana stroked Anna's hair hugging her with the other arm and turned to the nurse "Sorry hmmm ... Marco, right? I thought I had understood that you were here to offer us your help and I think that's my daughter here who need support and not the ego of her father or your own frustration!"

Unison Finn and Anna reproached Santana and the nurse blushed turning to the girl suddenly. Santana let out a slight "Sorry" addressed to all those present, but without much intention. Anna got the answer she wanted when the nurse told her that she could keep her clothes until the evening when she should change to go to bed. Then Marco left the room submissive for being unprofessional urging the three to call him if they needed help. A few minutes pass then from the hallway they heard voices of children who were heading towards Anna's room. Finn approached the door but promptly retreated before being swept by a wave of loud children, some standing, some in wheelchairs, some in dressing gowns, some in civilian clothes or overalls, followed by a group of parents equally noisy and led by a young woman who first came into the room and snapped her fingers towards the children who suddenly began still and silent behind her, like many bowling pins in a bowling alley. The young woman was pretty good looking, she had light eyes, almost gray with shades of green and red hair collected in two side braids. She wore colorful striped tights with a predominance of orange, an orange tutu and a tight colorful stripes jersey just like the tights. The dress showed off the young woman's body's proportionate curves and fake freckles she had drawn in her face didn't hide the joviality of her spirit. Santana saw that the four wheelchairs were pushed by four nurses, or at least seemed so because they wore what looked like scrubs, but they were colored with the same horizontal stripes of the young woman's dress. After the first moment of fright at the sudden raid, Anna seemed amused and intrigued by the group that had just entered her room. Then the young woman spoke.

"My name is Sara, and you're Anna, right?" She approached the girl but Anna clung to her mother's neck being careful to leave a little space to glance that Sara. Then she nodded.

"Ciao Anna!" (_"Hello Anna!"_) She said, then snapped her fingers again to the group behind her and magically the children in chorus repeated "Ciao Anna!" (_"Hello Anna!"_) and then began to laugh, but Sara snapped her fingers again and silence came again. "Would you like to come with all these kids and me to watch a show?" Anna looked up from her mother's chest and looked at Santana's eyes to find an answer to the question, but Santana just smiled and then Anna took all her courage and turned to the young woman pointing the tutu, "Are you a dancer?" Sara nodded and reached for the child as to help her out, but Anna plunged her head into Santana's neck again "You come with me, mami?"

Before Santana could answer Sara looked at her and Finn and said, "Dr. Patrice is waiting for your parents to talk to them, and while the adults talk we are going to have fun! How about Anna, it seems like a good plan?" Anna shook her head "I'm not going without you two?" Again Sara anticipated Santana before she reassure her daughter. It seemed that the young woman didn't want to let anyone of the parents interfere with her persuasion and this, rather than disturb Santana reassured her, she seemed to be a person they both could trust in.

"Do you like dancers?" Sara asked and Anna looked at her and nodded.

"When I'll be healed I'm going to become a dancer!" the little girl said and Sara's face lit up, she had found the key to get into the good graces of the child. "And you're American, right?".

Anna nodded again intrigued by where she's leading that speech.

"You know, Anna, I'm a good dancer, but in the show that we're going to watch there's the most outstanding dancer of the whole world!" Sara exaggerated words and spread her hands in a huge circle to symbolize the world.

"Really?" Anna asked shyly and Sara nodded.

"And I tell you a secret, but don't tell anyone, promise!"

"I promise!" Anna said immediately.

"We stole her from America! More precisely from Ohio! Do you know where's Ohio?" Anna's eyes lit up, Finn's laughed, Santana's snapped perplexed to Sara frowning her eyebrows and trying to figure out if that girl was honest or had learned confidential information about their families, ready to make a pandemonium at the hospital. "Of course! All my grandparents live in Ohio!" Anna excitedly hopped on Santana's lap.

"Really?" Sara asked Santana.

"Really?" Santana asked Sara in inquisitorial and not at all friendly tone.

"Really!" Sara answered now conscious of having conquered the girl "We picked her up in Ohio and brought her here ... you have to come and see her because she is really great!"

"Mami can I?" This time the girl asked her mother to go with Sara and Santana threw a puzzled look back to the young woman and then bowed her head to kiss her daughter on the forehead and put her down. "Sure, have fun sweetie!"

"We bring her back in bedroom as soon as the show is over, if you haven't done yet with Dr. Patrice." Sara said to Santana and then "You just have to learn a thing before we go! Watch!" Sarah said to Anna and snapped her fingers. The children spoke and moved and laughed. Sara snapped her fingers again and the children returned silent and still. "Got it Anna?" Anna smiled and nodded, because it was simple, Sara snapped her fingers once and all had to stand still and silent, then Sara snapped her fingers again and all could talk and move. Simple. Anna waved to her parents and shaking Sara's hand walked away from the room. Santana appeared at the door, she didn't know whether to trust or not, she watched the procession go to the elevators while Sara shared with Anna the other children's names. To her right stood nurse Marco. "Excuse me, Mrs. Lopez, you and Mr. Hudson should reach Dr. Patrice to his office, if you are ready I bring you to him." Santana called Finn and together they followed the nurse who led them in a waiting room. The room was small but a large window let in the sunlight that illuminated the walls painted with a huge tree that had its roots drawn on the floor, its trunk on the walls and its foliage on the roof.

There were three other people in the room. Santana and Finn kindly greeted them with a "Good morning!" to which a lady answered with a "Buongiorno!" and a couple, locked in the corner where the trunk was drawn, holding hands and nervously tapping their feet on the ground, replied with a "Buenos dias!". The nurse announced that Dr. Patrice had just arrived in his office and that they had to wait their turn to speak with him and then he disappeared. Santana looked around and Finn began to speak, but she didn't want to hear him and when he realized he was talking to himself, stroked slightly Santana's back and sank into the chair in silence. Santana did the same, heartened by the fact that Finn seemed to understand the vortex of feelings writhing into her stomach, and he cared about her enough not to blame her for her surly attitude. Santana tried in every way to distract her thoughts and ended up turning her attention to the dancer from Ohio Sara mentioned earlier. She wondered if Anna was enjoying herself at that time and who knows if she was really good that dancer, even though Santana thought that there was only one dancer in Ohio that could be called "the most outstanding dancer of the whole world".

A heartbeat hit hard her sternum making her tremble and Santana threw out a sigh of anger at the thought of that certain dancer, trying to throw it back in one of those dusty drawers of her mind that read "DANGER DO NOT OPEN!". It wasn't possible to her to find a quite positive thought to distract her mind. Santana pulled out her iPhone and started to play Candy Crash. Playing at least she wouldn't have thought.


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

Anna was sitting between Sara's crossed legs while the young woman was sitting on the floor. She didn't want to sit with the other children, in Sara's arms she felt safer. In front of her there were two men who had to be two doctors because they were wearing the white coat, even if one of them had a red painted nose and white hair in two braids that fell down his shoulders.

They spoke a bit in English and a bit in other languages, sometimes they also spoke Spanish, and Anna could understand something of what they said, but it wasn't so important to understand, they were both funny and made her laugh. Especially the other doctor, not the one with the braids, the one who had a really big belly and an earnest look, and in fact, as far as Anna could understand, he was talking about serious things, like diseases and medicines but the other doctor, the braided one, did strange things around him, looking at him with faces that were halfway between the surprised one and frightened one. Anna understood that the big belly doctor had given the order to the braided one to do a surgery to one of the children in the audience: they picked a boy from the audience and now the big belly doctor was giving final instructions for the surgery, touching and tickling the laughing boy. Then the braided doctor called someone to help him and another doctor appeared.

"She is the dancer?" Anna asked, turning to her Sara nodded.

Anna looked at the woman come in the stage, she was really pretty, and the first thing she noticed was her long blond hair. Anna didn't know many blonde people, perhaps before her illness, but now that she was almost always at home, there was just aunt Quinn who had blond hair and she didn't see her very often. All the others in her family were dark: mami, papi, aunt Rach and siblings had dark hair, grandparents Lopez had also dark skin, Uncle Kurt and Uncle Blain had brown hair and there was granny Carol who was sometimes brunette, sometimes ginger and sometimes blonde, because she liked to change and grandpa Burt who had no hair at all and always wore a hat and Leroy and Hiram who were white hair and olive skin. Then there was Karen who had light brown hair but she didn't really count. Anna realized at that moment that she really liked blonde people and that there should have been more blonds in her life. Later she would even told mami: she wanted some blonds in her family. Blondes was so different, they had pale skin that seemed almost transparent compared to hers, and they had mostly blue eyes and the blond she was looking at now had two wonderful blue eyes, blue like the summer sky and she had freckles across her nose and cheeks. The woman introduced herself as Doc Brie. Doc Brie. Anna repeated that name because she wanted to imprint it in her mind. She also had a white coat and a stethoscope around her neck and a pen, with a tuft of pink feathers that fluttered every time she moved, came out of her coat's chest pocket. She put a pair of glasses on her nose, but it was obvious that they had no lenses, then took them off frowning, she breathed above them and with the coat she wiped the lenses that there weren't there. This made all the children laugh and Anna laughed too. Then the woman put her glasses again, took a medical record and, listening to the big belly doctor, she started taking notes with her fluttering pen, but that pen didn't really want to write and it seemed a pink pet, because it moved and communicated with the woman just as if it was alive, to relax it Doc Brie started to stroke it whispering sweet words to it, but the pen pet, named Puck, continued to fidget in the women's hands, and so Doc Brie asked the braided doctor to sing a lullaby. He started to sing a lullaby, perhaps in Italian, and he had a really sweet voice and then a girl appeared dressed in the suit that nurses wore there, but she also wore an orange tutu just like Sara, and in her shoulder she held a violin with her chin and followed shy the doctor's song. The nurse with the violin approached the group of doctors and the sound became louder and then Doc Brie took off her shoes and white coat and under she was wearing a white dress closed with a blue ribbon under her breast, blue as her eyes, tied behind her back with a big fluttered bow, and a pair of blue leggings that reached below her knees. Doc Brie danced. She moved as soft as the snow when it falls slowly on New York and, blown by the wind, it fell slightly swaying and spinning in the air and lands without a sound. She moved the whole body and Anna didn't believe it could be possible to move all the muscles of the body at the same time as she did: head, arms, legs, torso, everything, everything together in perfect time with the melody that came from the violin and it seemed to Anna to live inside a cartoon because the dancer was amazing, and she couldn't be real! Anna stood up to look better, in front of her there were children who hid Doc Brie with their heads when she threw herself to the ground.

She stood up.

Brittany locked her eyes with hers. The music played but she paused for a moment nailed by that child's dark eyes. She was the same little girl who she had seen few hours earlier in the car, the little girl who had grimaced, the same dark eyes. Brittany resumed to dance, but she didn't unlock her eyes with the girl's, a strange sense of safety and relief flooded her, captured by those eyes. It couldn't be just a coincidence, Brittany let the thought of fate gave her the inspiration for the last cambré and then the dance ended, the show ended, the applause ended, the children's chatter ended, the crowd that came to watch her dance melted away, there was just the dark eyed little girl who held Sara's hand and stared at her. Brittany approached and knelt in front of her.

"Ciao!" Brittany said watching as the girl hid herself shy behind Sara's arm.

"Hi!" the girl said with a small voice. Brittany smiled, but the girl didn't return the smile.

The woman stood up and asked Sara who was the girl and why she didn't come back to her room as everyone else and Sara explained that her parents were still talking to Roy and that she was bringing her upstairs. Instinctively Brittany volunteered to bring her back to the room, she had to do, she knew she had to take care of her in that right moment and so she knelt back to the girl.

"May I have the honor to walk with you to your room?" The little girl hid behind Sara's legs this time and looked up at her finding a big smile in the young woman's lips.

"If I were you I would agree 'cause she's the most outstanding dancer of the whole world!" Sara laughed.

Brittany was not tired of looking at her, of controlling every feature, every curve of her face, there was something familiar about her, there was much more then something, that little girl was her past, her home. And the more she glared at her the more she felt the bond between them long before her birth and her every cell rejoiced because finally, finally after so many years, fate had found its way to put things right in her life. But she still didn't want to be too positive, she had to be sure, and then she would let the fate in, around her and inside her. Because she was ready. She was always ready.

"My name is Brittany, but everyone here calls me Doc Brie, or just Brie. What's your name?"

The little girl started to rock excited and frightened by the idea of walk with Doc Brie. "Anna." she said in a whisper. Brittany reached out and waited for the girl. Their faces were a few inches away from each other. Anna now could see all the freckles and pink lips of the woman who was smiling at her and this time she smiled back to her. Anna took the blonde's hand and stretched her lips in a warm and sincere smile and in her cheeks appeared two deep semicircular dimples and Brittany knew. At that very moment she understood. No, she had never forgotten her best friend, her great American love. She had waited for her. She realized that in the last fifteen years she had waited for her every single day, because she had always known that one day or the other she would see her again. She didn't know when, but sooner or later she would see her again. Her heart beat furiously, cheeks and ears dyed red and tears formed at the base of her eyes. She let her thoughts ran free in every corner of her mind, that little girl was Santana. The awareness busted her. For a moment, she lost track of time: she no longer knew where she was, she didn't even know who she was and what she was doing there kneeling, everything was so confused, but she knew with perfect certainty that there was Santana inside that little girl in front of her: there was Santana in her dimples, there was Santana in her warm hands, there was Santana in her hair and in the darkness of her eyes and there was Santana in her scent that now hurt her nose and her memories. Brittany opened her mouth but the words shut down her throat, she wanted to find confirmation of her thoughts, but there was no need, Brittany knew. She squeezed Anna's hand, she had no intension to do so, but she wanted more than anything else tighten Anna in a hug, sinking her nose in her silk brown hair, she wanted to close her eyes and be intoxicated by the image of Santana that now ran fast in every vein of her body. She realized that the nostalgia she felt in the past fifteen years whenever she sang, whenever she let her go to the memory of her past life, it wasn't true, because at that moment it showed itself as the true feeling which she had given just the wrong name to, that feeling was not nostalgia, it was pain, pain due to the lack of Santana. She missed getting lost in her eyes, in her skin, in her laughter, in conversations stolen at the routine, in games and in silences. She missed love, the love she felt and the love she received, the security that she gave her, she missed feeling special in her arms, feeling beautiful in her touches, feeling important only for being there. She missed letting go at the thought of her.

Anna noticed the agitation of the woman and her smile disappeared, but Brittany stood up, holding her hand and walked to the elevator, after saying goodbye to her colleagues who were still talking about the performance just played.

"Are you cold?" Anna asked to Brittany as they entered the elevator and the woman felt that she was shaking and that the little girl had to feel her hand tremble in her little one.

"No." Brittany had the strength to speak this time, "Did you like the show?" She changed the subject talking about the performance as the elevator closed its doors.

Santana could no longer sit in the chair in the doctor's office. She and Finn had waited, then came in the office, then they had talked about Anna: the doctor had told them that he would have decided for the surgery only after all the medical analysis, and Santana already knew and didn't want to hear it again. Time passed and she knew that the show was over and didn't want to leave her daughter in strangers' hands for yet another time, but she was nailed in that office because a damn printer had begun to throw tantrums and they had to sign the "fundamental" consent to the processing of personal data. Santana's restlessness was visible and annoying.

"Something's wrong?" the doctor asked.

"It's 11, the show is over, my daughter will back in bedroom and none of us is going to wait for her, it's wrong the fact that I have to wait here a stupid printer spitting out a few sheets of which I don't see the usefulness rather than to be with her now." Santana said that all in one breath and then sighed.

"Ok, I understand, your daughter is surely not alone, if you want me to check her I'll make a call."

"Please!" Santana said quite sarcastic without betraying her concern.

Dr. Patrice pulled out his cell phone, pressed the button and called Sara, then opened the speakerphone so that Santana heard what they were saying to reassure her.

"Hey Roy! Che c'è? " (_"Hey Roy! What is it?"_)

Roy replied in English, "I'm here with Anna Hudson-Lopez's parents, we were wondering if the girl is already back in her room."

"Yes, she went up right now with Brittany, she said she wanted to bring her in the room, and that she would wait for the parents."

"Ok thank you!" and he said goodbye and then to the parents with a really big smile "Don't worry, she is with a colleague of mine, Brittany, she's a great woman and kids love her!" The doctor said fumbling again with his computer to find a way to get it communicate with the printer. Brittany. Santana repeated the name that the two had set out so easily. Brittany. Finn looked at her with a bored glance, was he thinking about what she was thinking now? Other words came to her mind, words spoken by that same young woman earlier.

The Ohio's dancer. The most outstanding dancer of the whole world. She looked at the doctor and immediately she looked back at Finn and ran her eyes quickly between the two men for some time as to find an answer, but without being able to decide who to ask for it, her heart sped up exponentially. Another picture hit her head and if she wasn't sitting she would certainly faltered. The blonde woman hugging the man with the red coat. In front of her there was the doctor with the red coat and the woman he was with was her, Brittany. She focused the memory of the scarf trailed on the floor and that of the woman's hand holding the coat: it was Brittany's hand. She put a hand to her mouth to hide the breath that became noisy. Finn looked at her inquiring and she returned his gaze confused and uncertain, then again a thrill of anger ran through her back and she took courage. "Excuse me!" The doctor looked up at Santana who was addressing again with an unfriendly tone, without waiting for the man to spoke she continued "The colleague you were talking about is ..." she picked up as much air as she could before to say aloud that name. Because Santana, in the last fifteen years, had done everything because that name didn't come anymore out from her lips, and had been very careful to convince her family to not tell it anymore. If sometimes they had talked about her, the only name that they had used was "the blonde cheerleader". Santana had tried in the past fifteen years to take her out of her mind and now it was scary to say her name again aloud. And what if her efforts to keep it out of her head were not served at all? She had always thought that if one day she had seen her again, she would have thrown her all the pain the woman had caused to her turning away and disappearing from her sight and out of her life as she had done. But now she was no longer sure of anything. "... Brittany Pierce. Brittany Susan Pierce?" She didn't yield, her voice was loud and clear and she didn't shake when she felt Finn's gaze fall surprised and scared on her. But the doctor's face answered that question before his words did. That face mixed with excitement and disbelief slapped her with such force that Santana had to shore up her hands to the desk to not stumbled when she tried to get up and looked at the doctor angrily spatting "We're leaving, don't bother to print that fucking paper!" Then she ran away from the office and Finn followed her and the doctor too, trying to ask the man for an explanation.

Brittany helped Anna to climb into bed. Anna was a cute little girl and smart and sweet. She also sat down on the bed making space between the clothes, she imagined, had been removed from the suitcase and laid carelessly on the bed. They talked about what Anna liked about the show and the girl complimented with the dancer at least a dozen times. A nurse appeared at the room and asked Brittany if parents were there. Brittany shook her head but didn't remove her eyes from the girl who stared the nurse with a sad and distrustful face.

"You don't like hospitals?"

Anna shrugged and bent her lips as if she didn't care at all.

"Mami don't like, I think she don't want me to be under the surgeon's knife. Maybe she's afraid, but she'll never tell that."

Brittany had forgotten for a moment that the girl was in that hospital, in the cardiology department in long-term care, that her parents were talking to Roy, heart surgeon, of course the child had to bear a heart surgery. In her eight years of work at the hospital she had tried in every way to think exclusively to the spiritual welfare of young patients and that meant make them laugh, relieve pressure and fear, and even though it was difficult and heartbreaking to see them suffer through their eyes, she had learned that children have within them an inexhaustible energy and strength that made them struggle every day with ease.

Brittany restrained herself from asking the girl if her mother's name was Santana. But she knew, Santana was that child's mother. Santana was a mother. Santana. Mother. She swallowed to clear her throat from the weeping that was climbing again to her eyes. She thought of Bryan. There have been a time when she wanted so desperately that Santana was her son's mother, that she was beside her to get things done when she was not good at them, to share with her that new kind of love. And she had dreamed a million times their life together, eyes closed and eyes open, in her dreams Santana was a great wife and a great mother. But she'd lost her chance, she'd let her go, she had left her to live her life, the life she chose to share with someone else, someone so special with whom she had formed a family, and had created a life. A flash of envy squeezed her stomach, that life could have been hers if only she hadn't let her go, but disappeared quickly. She knew she had made the right choice. For both. And now she was thrilled and excited and ecstatic and frightened and overwhelmed at the idea of meeting Santana again.

"I don't like when they come to take my blood!"

"Oh…" Brittany nodded. "We are very good here, you know? And we're also very nice!"

"And almost all your coats are not white!" Anna smiled, pointing Brittany's coat. "Why is yours white?"

"Well, I'm a little special doctor!" she laughed winking at the girl. "But I can always take it off if the white color bothers you!"

Anna nodded and Brittany put the stethoscope on the bed and took off her coat, remaining in her costume. Anna looked pleased and then turned her attention to the stethoscope while Brittany sat down again.

"Can I hear your heart?" Anna asked. There have been a lot of doctors in her life and some of them let her use their stethoscopes and she had heard her own heart, her mami's or her papi's, but she had never heard a doctor's heart, who knows how could beat a doctor's heart!

"Hmmm ok, but I must warn you, now my heart's going really fast!"

"Yes? And why? Is it because you danced?"

"Maybe…" Brittany laughed to herself. Or maybe it's because Santana is inside you, she thought.

Then she lowered the collar of her dress to make room for the stethoscope and the girl hurried to put it in her ears and place it over her heart.

"I don't feel anything!" She said annoyed, maybe doctors had not a heart? She thought. Brittany then put her hand on Anna's and drove it a bit lower and the girl's face exploded again in a smile of amazement as Doc Brie's heart shook her ribcage.

"Wow!" the girl exclaimed, "You were right, it's really fast and loud!" She laughed amused and the woman laughed with her. "But it doesn't go always so fast, right?"

"Oh no!" Said Brittany, "Only when I have in front of me a pretty young lady like you!"

Anna blushed and shook her head on her shoulders.

"Hearing your heart running so fast mine is going faster too!" Anna put her hand to her chest laughing.

Brittany adjusted herself on the bed, facing the girl and pushing her left foot under her. She was visibly excited "Hey, it's my turn now! Gimme the stethoscope!" Brittany stretched her arms, frantically moving her fingers waiting for the girl.

"Sure!" Anna said enthusiastically giving it to her, while throwing herself lying on the bed and pulling up her shirt. This doctor could visit her whenever she wanted, she could also take her blood!

"It's cold?" asked Anna.

"Not at all, I've warmed it!" And then she leant the stethoscope on the girl's chest. Her little heart was beating fast and furious in an abnormal beat, sometimes limping, sometimes almost stopping. That was really sad for Brittany such a little girl with such a big issue, but she smiled.

From the hallway muffled voices of people came to Brittany's ears who still was listening to the girl's heart. Anna's eyes widened and she turned her head toward the door, Brittany did the same at the moment when Santana came in.

Dark.

Oh God.

Pause.

Everything stopped. At that moment lasted an eternity there was nothing around her. Before yells, before tears, before pain, everything stood still, suspended between reality and imagination. And she didn't even know where the one ended and the other began. Santana. Santana Lopez. Had appeared. Had materialized in front of her as one of the Genie's magics in front of Aladdin, a stunning and glorious magic. Santana. A dream. But that dream, that magic, seemed the only real thing now, as if everything around her was fake, the hospital, the work, her life, everything was fake, just her, her dream, at that moment was real.

"Get your hands off her now!"

Brittany woke up. Santana was shouting at her.

"Don't touch her!" Santana went on a rampage and slapped Brittany's hand that was still holding the stethoscope in Anna's heart.

Santana had just hit her?

Then Santana took a step back crossing her hands to her chest and clenching her jaw, waiting for the blonde to go away from her daughter and challenging Brittany to bear her raging eyes.

Brittany couldn't say anything, she looked at her until Finn came into the room. Finn Hudson?

"What are you doing to my daughter?" It was a question he didn't want an answer to, it was a nice way to express the thought that Santana had vomited on her. Their daughter? They didn't want her to touch Anna. Brittany froze for a moment. Roy also entered the room and looked questioning at the three adults. Brittany looked at Roy and it was the only thing that at that time gave her a bit of safety. A lump of tears filled her throat and started to burn. Santana Lopez, the only person in her old life who had believed in her, the only person who had supported and understood her, now with those few words, was treating her like the stupidest of the stupid people in the world. They didn't want her to touch their daughter because they would never trust her. Their daughter. With those few words Santana wrecked Brittany's world, everything she had built up over the last fifteen years, the conquests she had made, the results she had achieved, the effort she had sweated to be the woman she was today, everything collapsed because, in front of Santana, that Santana who was standing a few feet away from her, she was back to being the same old stupid naïve Britt-Britt. It was humiliating and painful.

A tear slid down her face, but quickly she wiped it with the sleeve of her beautiful costume and then got up and picked up her coat from the desk chair. She swallowed the pain and rummaged in its side pocket. She pulled out her hand in a tight fist, all without taking her eyes from Santana. In silence. Then she turned and sit back down in bed turning her eyes to Anna and smiling. But her eyes were not smiling. Anna was asking for explanations, but none of the present adults was answering her, the room seemed to be colder than when she had entered with Doc Brie. Why her mother had yelled at her?

"Give me your hand." Brittany asked Anna and heard Santana move on her heels and turn to Roy urging him to get her out, but Brittany had to do something.

Anna reached for Brittany and opened her hand, she realized that she wanted to give her something that was hidden in her fist. Doc Brie leant her fist on her palm and slowly opened her fingers. Anna felt something metal slipping in her palm, Brittany then withdrew her hand. In the girl's palm there was a silver pendant sliding in a black ribbon.

"You know what's this?"

Anna nodded and smiled. "It's an unicorn!" She exclaimed pleasantly surprised.

Brittany nodded and smiled, "It's a lucky charm. Unicorns are very special horses you know?" Anna put the necklace with the unicorn around her neck and the pendant slid down her chest, above her heart. "Unicorns are very powerful and invincible, even a little magic. And you have to promise me that you will be just like this unicorn here! Ok?" She pointed to the unicorn and then with the same finger touched the girl's nose. "Promise?" Anna touched Doc Brie's nose back "Promise!" Both exchanged a warm smile.

"Goodbye, little Anna!" she said getting out of bed.

"Bye Doc Brie!" The little girl said to the blonde before she turned her back. Anna didn't see that Brittany closed her eyes passing near her mother, and she didn't hear her mother swallow when Brittany left the room. She felt only the cold that had fallen into her room and that now was stronger because Doc Brie had gone.

Brittany grabbed Roy's hand rushing out of the room and shook it as hard as she could dragging the man away from the room, down the hallway. "Why didn't you tell me?" Brittany's face was red and her mouth was trembling. "Dirti cosa? Mi spieghi cosa è successo? Li conosci?" _("__Tell you what? __Can you e__xplain me __what happened? __Do you know them__?")_.

Brittany hid her face in her hands and let out a sob. And then another. And then another. She struggled to breathe, but the air refused to get into her lungs. Roy approached her and shook her forearm and then gently stroked her arms "Brie respira, calmati, ti prego..." _(__"Brie __breathe__, calm down, __please ..."_) She swallowed and her throat burned, she started to tremble, finally she sighed and the air entered trembling to bring her back to life. "Brie, mi spieghi?" (_"__Brie? __Can you explain me__?"_) With great sighs she tried to adjust the breath and then she removed her hands from her face. "T-ti dispiace se va-vado via adesso?" (_"__D-do you mind if __I g__-__go __away now__?"_) Roy had never seen her like this. Every muscle of her face was shaking and her eyes were bloodshot with no tears and she had an expression of pain that contorted her face as if she was wearing a mask over her joyful and light features that characterized her. He had never seen her like this. "Non hai intenzione di dirmi cosa succede, vero?" (_"You're __not going __to tell me what__'s going on, right?"_) The man asked, worried.

"No, non adesso, non…non ora. Ora non ce la faccio…" (_"No, __not now, not__...__not now. __Now __I can't...__"_) Roy nodded.

"Mi si spezza il cuore a vederti così, Brie. Brittany in modalità triste non riesco a sopportarla!" (_"__It breaks my __heart to __see you like this, __Brie.__ I can't bear Brittany hurt mode!__"_) Brittany smiled at the Roy's clumsy attempt to cheer her and looked at him with pleading eyes.

"Posso fare qualcosa per te?" (_"__Can I do something __for you?"_) the man asked.

"Lasciami uscire adesso, ho bisogno di stare un po' da sola." (_"Let me out of work __now__, __I need to spend __a little __time on my own__."_)

"Certo che puoi uscire!" (_"Sure you can __go!"_)

Brittany nodded, thanked him and then walked to the locker room.

"Brie, chiamami se hai bisogno di me!" (_"Brie__, call me if __you need me__!"_) Roy volunteered and Brittany turned around for a moment, smiling at the man. She rushed the locker room, gathered her staff and ran out without changing her costume looking down trying to avoid the people around her, she slipped into the car and drove off. Her heart ached. She tried in every way to keep a clear head, to disperse her thoughts, but her heart continued to ache. She turned on the radio, then turned it off, she took off her scarf and then put it back. She didn't have to think. She didn't have to think about Santana. Another sob flew out her lips. She arrived at the gym where usually she spent most of her afternoons without greeting anyone and slipped in the dance studio. The room was empty. Brittany walked over to the stereo and turned it on. She gave herself up to the music and danced while she let the thoughts of her muscles replaced those of her head.

She spent the afternoon in that way, among dancing and girls and choreography. More than seven hours had passed since that morning and Brittany remembered she had not even eaten. Or rather, her stomach remembered grumbling grimly. It occurred to her that she had planned an evening with Bryan and therefore she got ready quickly in order to be home as soon as possible. She collected her stuff, she took the phone from her purse and saw that there were two calls from her parents' house and a morning text from Bryan. She quickly read the text:

- Mi hai comprato di nuovo, con i tuoi programmi per la serata, lo sai? Non vedo l'ora di passare un po' di tempo con te. Ti voglio bene Ma! Il tuo BoringBoy! ;P (_Y__ou bribed __me__ again __with your __plans for the evening__, you know? __I can't wait __to spend some__time with you__. __I love you __Ma! __Your __BoringBoy__! __;P_ )

Brittany smiled at her son's message and felt guilty for not having replied. But she often didn't reply to texts and Bryan was used to it.

She left the gym and went into her car and drove off putting the headset in her ears. She called her parents' house and her mom answered. "But where were you? I called you ten times! "

"Mom you called me twice and you know that when I'm at work I can't answer. Did you want something?"

"You and Bry have dinner with us tonight!" Susan said excitedly. "I cooked pizza and chips!"

Brittany felt sorry when she told her mother that that night was mother and son night and that for anything in the world she would have given up. Her mother muttered a few words of disappointment but she understood and they continued the call chatting about their day and some gossip about mutual friends. Brittany was silent for most of the time, it happened often with her mother, but she was grateful for that phone call in which she tried to pay full attention. It was dark outside and while driving Brittany felt that the memory of the morning came back powerful in her heart and in her throat and in her eyes. Santana. That face full of anger and mistrust.

She would never believe that her Santana could ever look at her in that way. She focused back on the conversation for a few seconds then said goodbye to her mother when she was already almost at home.

Home at last. Brittany was exhausted when she opened the door. Her head felt heavy as if there was a balloon full of air in it ready to explode.

"Ma, sei te?" (_"Ma, is you?"_) Brittany was unable to answer but she walked to the door of the living room where her son's voice came from. She opened the door and leaned against the door frame. "Ciao Ma! Finisco il capitolo e poi mangiamo!" (_"Hi, __Ma! __I finish __the chapter and then __we can __have dinner__!__"_) He said without looking up from the book he was studying. The room was lit and Bryan was sitting on the carpet and his head sunk on one of his books resting on the table. He was really beautiful her child. He had blond hair pulled over the head with a hairband. He had sweet features and pale skin. He was smart, very smart and sensitive, and it was an awesome pianist. Bryan was the most extraordinary thing she had done in her entire life and came out really well. She felt silent tears streaming down her cheeks. Why? Why she had met Santana again? Why Santana had treated her like that? Why all that anger? And yet whenever she dreamed of meet her again Santana smiled at her and hug her resting her chin in her shoulders and in dreams Brittany felt that chin and her breathing close to her ear and her hands in her back. Why reality is never up to dreams? She sobbed and that was when Bryan turned his eyes to her. "Ma?" he asked worried about hearing and seeing his mother crying. She shook her head without answering and walked over to her son. Bryan got up from the ground and sat on the couch watching his mother approaching. She sat down next to him and clung to his waist wrapping him with her arms. She buried her face in Bryan's neck and started to cry. Bryan encircled her holding her tightly by the shoulders, he tighten the woman who trembled and shook and it seemed to him that if he loosened his grip she would break, she was so fragile in his arms. She knew she shouldn't, she mustn't cry, Bryan was her son, and even if it didn't seem, he was still a boy and he didn't deserve to see his mother so weak and fragile, but she couldn't help it. Brittany let herself be lulled by the reassuring hands of her child caressing her head and arms. Bryan said nothing. It had been so long since the last time he had seen her like this, he was really a boy, maybe he was five, the last time he had found her crouching on the bathroom's floor who threw out her soul with her eyes and her sobs. Also that day he had said nothing, he had embraced her and reassured her, and when she had stopped crying, he had made her promise she would never cry that way anymore and Brittany had kept her promise. Until that day.

"I'm sorry Bry..." she whispered imperceptibly into Bryan's neck.

"Shhh Ma, it's okay, everything will be fine..." Bryan put his lips on his mother's head and kept comforting her, caressing her and rocking her until she turned her sobs in sniffs and little by little Bryan felt that one by one she released all her muscles and the tight to his waist became more absent and lightened. He felt his mother shook one last time, her breathing became heavier and a single tear fell from her closed eyes. Bryan knew that Brittany fell asleep. He moved his head to one side and looked at her face. When she slept she looked like a baby. He was worried. He brushed a kiss on her forehead and grabbed the remote that was on the left, trying not to wake his mother. He turned on the television, "Bè, la cena dovrà aspettare!" (_"Well, __dinner __is going to wait__!"_) He said to himself, and adjusted on the couch placing his feet on the table and on his books waiting his mother to calm down sleeping.

**A/N:** Thank you very much for reading. It's exciting to know that there are people who read my story and like it! Thanks! Thanks!  
Sorry for the angst of this chapter, but it serves the story and you have to know that I firmly believe in happy endings! I put in brackets the translations of the Italian dialogues as some of you asked me, if you also want those of the previous chapters, ask, even if Google translations may help a lot! Sorry for the mistakes! I guess there are lots of them!


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

Something that was rhythmically pressing on her lower back suddenly brought her back to consciousness. She was lying on her stomach and she was sure not to be in her bed because her neck and back ached. A grunt of disapproval came out of her mouth as she pulled the blanket, lying on her, up over her ears burying her head. She realized that the weight on her back was Lord Tubbington III as soon as he crouched in the hollow of her back resting his head on her butt and immediately the smell of milk and toast came to her nostrils.

"Tubb go please! I'm sleeping!" She tried to send away the cat stretching her arm behind her back from under the blanket, but the cat mistook it for a new game of his owner, and started to kick with his hind legs and sank his teeth and front legs' nails in the blanket, which didn't survive the attack and let them pierce Brittany's hand's flesh under her thumb.

"TUBB!" Brittany shouted, sitting up abruptly and making the cat jump backwards who fell off the couch on all fours.

Brittany looked at her hand. She had two small holes near the knuckle of her left hand's thumb from which a drop of blood came out. She brought her hand to her mouth and licked the blood sucking lightly and Tubb, sitting on the carpet in the floor, with lithe lateral movement of his head, licked his shoulders straightening the fur ruffled in the fall.

"Non si fa Tubb!" (_"__Don't do this again Tubb__!__"_) Brittany scolded him, and he turned his head toward the voice he had just heard, he froze for a moment, looking at Brittany's eyes, then stood up and walked slowly and haughty towards the kitchen holding the tail up straight as an antenna.

Brittany realized she had slept on the couch and her heart, with a shudder, reminded her what happened the day before: the memory came all together, like a flood, the previous twenty-four hours, surfaced in her mind like a fist and Brittany shook her head and put her hands to her eyes to not let win back the tears. Her eyes were rough and her face dry and taut; she guessed she had been crying in her sleep and her tears had dried on her cheeks. Her head was heavy and filled and her stomach was empty. She heard sounds of dishes from the kitchen. Bryan was making ... what? dinner? or maybe breakfast? She watched the window in front of her and saw that it was dark outside, but that didn't help her to understand what time it was. On the table Bryan's books were no longer scattered and the door to the vestibule, from which she had entered the night before, was closed. She addressed her gaze to the clock on the DVR located in the cabinet under the television in front of the table and as soon as she focused she saw that it was six o'clock. She didn't want to go to the kitchen. She didn't want to face Bryan. She didn't want to go to work. She didn't want to turn the light on and shape the reality that was waiting for her, she just wanted to stay there, wrapped in darkness and silence, pretending that nothing had happened and that it had been just a bad dream.

She sighed and stood up from the couch. She turned around trying not to stumble on her shoes and walked toward the kitchen too, following in the cat's footsteps, but when she looked out to her right the arch that separated the living room from the kitchen and she saw Bryan intent removing a pot from the stove, she couldn't go to him and went straight slipping in the bathroom. She turned on the cold water faucet: being December, the water was frozen and as soon as she shoved her hands under the jet, it was as if a thousand needles pierced her skin. She shivered, but same she cupped her hands and let deposit in the middle a bit of water that she threw immediately after in her face. She stood breathless for a second when her warm skin from the sleep met the freezing water, but then she felt the extreme benefit: water washed the residues of tears and stretched the skin and wiped her swollen eyes. She knew that her son was worried about her and that she had to give him an explanation of what had happened. She knew that he wouldn't have been satisfied with her silence or a simple set phrase. He'd forced her to speak in one way or another. Just that Brittany had absolutely no idea what to say to Bryan. She had never talked to him a lot of her life in America. Bryan knew she had lived in Lima, Ohio, that she had been a cheerleader, that she had been part of a Glee club, that she had a lot of friends and she was with his father when she got pregnant, and a couple of memories related to those informations. And then he knew what everybody knew: that she had left there her Great American Love. She wanted to share with his son every moment, every feeling, every memory, but it was kind of a deal with her parents, Brittany didn't have a good reputation in high school. She remembered as if it had been the day before when she walked into the kitchen where her mother was crying sitting with her head resting on her hands. His father was behind her and he had red eyes too. As soon as she had entered her mother had stood suddenly and had run to Brittany slapping her. Brittany couldn't figure out what was happening.

"You're a stupid!" her mother had yelled in her face and then had dipped her head again in her hands, and his father had run to console her.

"Four years ago we were told to keep an eye on you because you were an easy girl, and we've said, okay, she's young, she's in the grip of hormonal turmoils. Two years ago, we were told about you and Santana and then we said, okay, maybe she's experiencing. Then you told us that you loved her, and as soon as we had got used to the idea, you had already left her and we thought ok, she wasn't the right one. You didn't graduate, you have no idea what you gonna do about your future, you're not even aware of what future is and then this! What should we do with you? This is not ok! How can you be our daughter?"

And then her father had shown Brittany her pregnancy test, the one she had thrown in her room trash the day before, she was sure to have thrown it there, why her parents had rummaged in her trash? She wanted to be angry with them for invading her privacy, for having slapped her, for calling her stupid, but seeing them so shocked and upset, she had realized that that whole thing was much bigger than she had imagined and then they had cried and talked all night and she had asked for help and "Do you love him?" they had asked and "No." she had replied, and "I don't wanna raise a child with him." she had added, "I already thought of everything, I'm going to tell Santana, I'm going to live in New York with her and she'll take care of me and the baby. We'll be two hot and cool moms!" she had naively assumed and then they had talked again and she had understood that she would never want to ruin Santana's dreams and life and her parents had persuaded her that the move was the only possible solution. It was already five years that her older brother Bentley lived in Italy. He worked as enologist in a vineyard in Tuscany, in the hills between Siena and Arezzo and he did nothing but praise those places: the sights, smells, traditions and peoples' values. Another continent. Another life. Start all over. That was what they had thought for her and the family Pierce's future member. Or maybe they hadn't thought to her at all, but to their reputation Brittany was ruining. It didn't take long to prepare their departure. In less than a month her parents and Bentley had organized everything, they had found a home, a job, a school for her sister Bianca. They would help her, they would take care of her and her child, the only thing she had to do was forget Santana, the Glee club, McKinley High, and her entire life. Because raising a child was a big responsibility and to a child must be transmitted healthy values and her son would never have known that she had been an easy girl, she had loved another girl and then a meaningless boy had knocked her up.

Brittany turned off the faucet and wiped her face. She was so naïve fifteen years earlier. Her parents had manipulated and had dragged her in Italy. And for the following six months she had fought with them every single day, she had run away from home and she had even tried to go back to America trying to buy a ticket with fake printed money. But then Bryan was born and she had stroked him and suddenly all the balances had shifted, everything she believed in before had been replaced by a new reality. And Italy, San Benedetto, the little village with 500 inhabitants, perched in the Arno Valley's hills, had become her second chance. And she simply had omitted her son that she was someone else before him. Someone he could be ashamed of as her parents did. And her Great American Love eventually had become just an idea, an ideal to strive for, a kind of state of mind. Not for her, but for others, for her son , for her friends, they didn't have a name, or a face, they were just a nickname that Brittany mentioned occasionally and that made her eyes sparkle. What would she say to him?

Finally she emerged from the bathroom and, leaning against the arch that separated the living room from the kitchen, waiting for her, there was Bryan and Brittany stepped back in surprise.

"Buongiorno! Sei riuscita a svegliarti alla fine?!" (_"Good morning! __Were you able to __wake up __finally__?"_)  
Brittany nodded approaching to her son.

"Ho preparato io la colazione stamani, ho pensato che fossi alquanto affamata, visto che ieri sera non hai mangiato!" (_"I __made breakfast __this morning__, I __thought you were __quite __hungry__, because __last night __you haven't eaten__!"_)

"Buongiorno amore mio!" (_"Good morning, __my love!"_) She ruffled her son's hair, grabbed his head and pushed it forward giving him a kiss on the head. Then she took him by the arm and together they approached the kitchen table. Bryan made his mom sit down, the table was set and he went to the stove and poured the hot milk in a cup.

"Mi dispiace!" (_"__I'm sorry!__"_) Brittany said to her son in a faint voice. Bryan walked quickly to her, put the cup of milk on the tablecloth and realized that if he didn't do immediately something, his mother would have cried again, and that was the last thing he wanted to see and hear that morning, so he hugged her from behind and put his head in her shoulder.

"Fa niente Ma! Capita a tutti una giornata no! Non ci prendere il vizio però!" _(__"__It __doesn't matter Ma__! __A bad day __happens to everyone__! __Let's hope it doesn't become a habit, __though__!"_)

Brittany found herself smiling and let her son's arms cradle her again as they had done the night before. Bryan immediately changed the subject and Brittany thought that maybe he wouldn't have asked what had happened to her.

"Ti dispiace se stamani vado a scuola con Eleonora, visto che sono già pronto posso andare in treno con lei!" (_"__Do you mind if __this morning __I go to school __with Eleanora, __since I am __already ready __I can __go with her by train!__"_)

Brittany nodded as she drank her milk. Bryan brought the mother a tray full of cookies and pastries.

"Le ho già mandato un sms, passa suo padre tra una mezz'ora e ci porta alla stazione, ok?" (_"I already texted her, his father __comes to __pick me up __in half an hour__ and he takes us to the railway station, ok?"_)

Brittany nodded again dipping a cookie in the milk.

"Anche te devi cominciare a prepararti, sennò come sempre farai tardi a lavoro." _(__"You__ should __start __getting ready too__, __otherwise __you'll be late __for work, as usual.__"_)

"Pensavo che forse stamani potrei stare a casa!" (_"I thought maybe __I could __stay home __this morning__!"_)

"Hmm!" Moaned Bryan sitting down next to his mother with his cup of milk close in his hands and eyeing her.

"Che c'è?" (_"What?__"_) She asked.

"Dunque ieri è successo qualcosa all'ospedale?" (_"So __yesterday__, something happened __at the hospital?__"_)

Brittany closed her eyes. Her son had not given up, he tricked her relaxing her to make her talk. Brittany nodded for the third time.  
"Che cosa?" (_"What?__"_) Bryan asked curiously.

"Possiamo non parlarne? Non mi va di parlarne adesso…" (_"Can we not __talk about it? __I don't __wanna talk about it __now..."_) Bryan said nothing but continued to look at her straight in the eyes. Brittany stared back at him for a few seconds but then she surrendered.

"Ok ok, ti devo una spiegazione! Hai ragione, come sempre…" (_"__Ok __ok__, I owe you __an explanation! __You're right, __as always ..."_) Bryan said nothing again, continuing to look at her, drinking his milk.

"Ieri c'era lo spettacolo per i nuovi bambini ricoverati, lo sai?" (_"__Yesterday we performed __for __the new __children __hospitalized__, you know?"_)

"Si, lo so!" (_"Yes, I __know it!"_)

"Bè, è capitato che tra i nuovi arrivati ci fosse la bambina di una mia…di due miei vecchi amici dell'High school." (_"Well, it __happened that __one of the __new arrivals __was the daughter of one of my…__two of my __old High__ School's friends.__"_)

"Davvero?" (_"Really?"_)

"Yeah..."

"E allora?" (_"So what?__"_)

"Non lo so, sai al liceo non ero molto…diciamo brillante e, non lo so, rivederli è stato come un tuffo nel passato e mi sono sentita stupida e ingenua come quando era al liceo!" (_"__I don't know__, __in High School __I wasn't very,__ you know__...smart __and,__I don't know__, __see them again __it was like a __dive into the past__, and I felt __dumb __and naïve__ like __when I was __in __High School_!_"_)

Bryan looked at his mother with questioning eyes. He wasn't convinced that she was telling the whole truth. The night before his mother was hurt, shocked, deeply sad and lost, he knew that there was more of a reunion gone wrong, and even though he knew that she was always very private about her past and that maybe she wouldn't answer but he tried to continue the interrogation.

"Erano tuoi amici?" (_"They were __friends of yours?__"_)

Brittany nodded. "Erano la mia seconda famiglia…" (_"They were __my second family__..."_)

"E allora non capisco, non sei stata contenta di rivederli?" (_"__And __I don't understand__, __you weren't __happy __to see them__?"_)

Brittany pursed her lips and looked for an answer into the room around her. The thought of seeing Santana, as she waited in the bedroom with her daughter had excited her, filled her with joy, sent her on cloud nine, and then? "They were not happy to see me."

"Why?"

Brittany shook her head. She didn't know why, after all she didn't know it, she guessed it was because they believed she was doing something bad to their daughter, but she hadn't stopped to ask. She had run away. Finn and Santana and a daughter, she still couldn't believe it, what kind of parallel universe she was living in?

"Fifteen years have passed since the last time I saw them, I don't know, maybe they have just changed so much, maybe I did something to her...to them that I can't remember, maybe they lived so well without me that the idea of seeing me again made them fly off the handle, I don't know!" at this thought a shiver ran through her back. If Santana had really been so well without her?

"They were angry with you?"

Brittany shrugged. "A little, before I left."

Bryan stood for a moment in silence. He wanted to ask his mother many other things, who they were, what they said, what they did. A feeling of tightness struck his chest, he wondered who could want to hurt his mother, he didn't like violence, but he would do anything to protect her. "I'm sorry Ma!" She smiled and reached out to Bryan grabbing and squeezing him in her chest, then she wrap him entirely with her strong arms and started giving him big kisses on his head and face.

"Ma stop! Smettila! Non sono più un bambino! Smettila di 'sbaciuccolarmi'!" (_"Ma Stop! Stop it! __I'm no more a baby! __Stop__ to '_sbaciuccolarmi_'__!__"_) His mother had invented this word when he was still a baby and she still didn't know Italian well, it was something like kiss and cuddle. "Ma Stooop!"

"Yes you are my child and until you're an adult I have the right to 'sbaciuccolarti' whenever I want!" She laughed, leaving the grip and Bryan slipped away, wiping his wet face from his mother's kisses.

Brittany laughed. It was nice to see her laugh again. If there was one thing that Bryan was envious of her was that whatever bad happened to her in a short time she came back smiling.

"I have to wash my face again!" Bryan said and Brittany laughed louder. "Now the serious stuff!" Bryan walked up to her, but being very careful to keep a safe distance in case her mom wanted to 'sbaciuccolarlo' again. He pointed his forefinger at her and frowned!

"Brittany you can't just hide in the house and avoid the problem! How long are you going to be locked in here? It's your job and, as you always say to me, you can't avoid it because you're afraid to face a problem, so get your ass off this chair and go get a shower because you have to go to work! Got it? "

Brittany looked intently at her son saying nothing but nodding with a straight face. Bryan dropped his index finger and turned to leave the room but lowering his guard and Brittany immediately snapped out of her chair and attacked him squeezing back into her arms. The two laughed and fought until Bryan managed to escape her mother and run to his bedroom while shouting "Go and take a shower!"

Brittany tidied the kitchen with a smile on her lips. She couldn't avoid to go to work, Bryan was right. She smiled proud of herself. She liked so much her son. He grew up in a completely different way from what she had imagined, it was the exact opposite of her, always serious and thoughtful, deep and clever, careful and mature, calm and empathetic and since he was no longer a child, but a teenager, it was nice to be able to relax and stop doing always the mother, she loved to be just his life partner.

If she couldn't avoid going to work, maybe she could avoid that room, maybe the entire hallway, basically she could do it. It was Wednesday and Wednesday was the day she and Sara and Mauro supported the doctors in their examinations to hospitalized children. It was enough to avoid the north hallway, Sara and Mauro could go there by themselves. She sighed and left the kitchen. She entered the entrance and headed for the stairs to her right, those leading to her rooms. She sighed again and went to get ready quickly to go to work. Her son was always right.

Santana unlocked the phone and checked the time. 6:30 am. Just 45 minutes had passed since she had looked at the clock the last time. And 1 hour and 20 minutes since the previous time. And 1 hour and 40 minutes since that before. And... It seemed that time had expanded and that night no longer had any end. She rolled over on the sofa bed being careful not to fall. It had been years, decades, that she hadn't slept in a twin-sized bed and, every time she moved, a feeling of emptiness invaded her and made her every muscle contract and tense unintentionally. How they could really believe, in this boring hospital, that an adult could sleep in those beds come directly from the furniture of the 80s Barbie Dream house! She snorted and rolled again over still trying to find an enough comfortable position to not break her bones. She stretched her legs and one foot hit the sofa bed's iron arm and she slammed painfully her big toe.

"A la mierda! Estoy harta de este maldito hospital y de toda..." (_"Fuck__! __I'm sick of __this damn __hospital __and all...__"_) she bit her lip clutching words in her mouth as soon as she remembered to be in the room with her daughter who was sleeping, but if she continued to swear like that Anna would certainly opened her eyes and reciprocated the language and ordered Santana to be more polite. She threw her legs out of bed, over the edge and sat down. She rested her elbows on her knees and started to rub her eyes with her fingertips. She was sure she would sleep if she hadn't been forced to rest in that tiny bed! Or maybe not: maybe the nurses' footsteps would have annoyed her or the chatter in the hallway. Maybe she might not have slept even if she had been in a fucking king-sized bed! That hospital sucked and the worst thing was that the more she tried to convince herself about this, the more she knew that her insomnia was due only to the return of a certain blonde in her life. No! No! But what was she talking about? What return? No one had returned. That blonde just passed for a moment. A shooting star. Here she was. Nothing but a goddamn shooting star, which would better be nailed in the firmament but she had fallen, disastrously in her way, and Santana had circumvented it and now everything was over. Why the hell they persuaded her to stay in that hospital? The day before, as soon as Brittany left the room, Santana went all Lima Heights on that doctor Patrice as she threw her daughter's clothes loose in the suitcase ready to run away from that hospital too. She was just cheating herself believing that there was a suitable hospital all around the world! But then they had convinced her. The doctor had convinced her, Finn had convinced her, but especially Anna had convinced her 'cause she did nothing but tell how much she liked that place and how amazing Doc Brie was and how wrong it was that Santana would run away even from there. Santana rubbed her right foot's big toe the one she had slammed against the sofa bed, making sure it was not broken. It hurt, but it was in one piece. She checked her watch. 6:47 am. She was told that at 8 am they would come to take Anna's blood and in the morning they would done all the other analysis: ECG, urine analysis (she had to remember to make pee Anna in the test tube), chest X-ray, examination from the anesthesiologist , and the next day they would told if and when Anna could have the surgery. And on when they suggested that they wouldn't have waited further than Sunday. She threw herself back onto the sofa bed and covered her eyes with her arm. Brittany appeared in front of her closed eyes. The teardrop coming down her face after she had hit her. It was scary as blood coming out of an open wound. She had hit and hurt the most beautiful, innocent, everything that's goo ... no, stop it! She was not that Brittany. That Brittany no longer existed. She has been dead and buried for fifteen years now. That woman she had met yesterday, the shooting star that had passed so briefly in her life, she was a nobody, nobody she knew or was worth knowing. And if she had cried ... well ... fuck all the damn pure at heart. She was Santana Lopez and was ready to kick the ass of all those people who wanted to hinder the path of Santana Lopez, even a fucking stupid shooting star! Saying that word thought so hard in her head, a feeling of guilt tingled her back. Why did she have to be always so bitch? Why did she always get defensive? Why thinking about Brittany upset her so much if she was just a fucking shooting star? Why then she thought about her? Certainly it was not the right place and the right time to psychoanalyze herself, so she decided that it was time to make that night end and got up gathering her clothes and slipped into the bathroom to change. Soon Finn would come to relieve her and she could go to the hotel to take a long hot shower and maybe she would relax all her thoughts and maybe she wouldn't see "her" that day. She changed quickly and left the bathroom.

"Mami?" Anna called her.

"Hey honey, why you're awake?"

"You're noisy!"

"I'm sorry babe, keep on sleeping." She approached the little girl's bed and put her face on the pillow facing Anna and stroking her hair.

"I want cuddles!" Anna asked and Santana laid down on the bed beside her and held the daughter to her chest. Anna leaned her head just above her mother's heart and felt it beat regularly, a beat ... after another ... after another ... she grabbed her mother's hand and started to caress the back of it. Her Mami had a so soft skin and her heart was ... so ... Both fell asleep in the warmth of a cuddle. Santana finally smiled.

When she woke up again the nurse she had met the previous day was tapping gently on her shoulder.

"What?" Santana asked in her sleep.

"Excuse me, Mrs. Lopez, I came to take Anna's blood sample!"

Santana stretched in bed and removed her hand from under Anna's, the loss of contact with her mother's skin woke her up immediately.

"Good morning honey!"

"Good morning Mami ..." Anna rubbed her eyes and then opened them and saw her mother, who had just sat up on the bed and was already dressed, she had a pair of baggy jeans and a gray T-shirt with the logo of NYADA on her chest, she was tying her hair into a ponytail. There was also Marco, the nurse. He had a yellow uniform that morning and next to him there was a metal cart and on the cart there were some test tubes and especially there was a syringe covered with a cap. Anna's blood froze in her veins and she felt like crying because she knew well what that cart meant.

Meanwhile, Santana got up and was looking for her phone to check the time. And as she turned around without remembering exactly where she had put it, the nurse asked the woman for permission to do his job. He was not used to do this, but that woman really scared him and put him in awe.

"Of course! What kind of questions are these!" She said annoyed and, while Marco unwrapped the syringe, she walked over to the sofa bed, lifted the covers and finally found the phone. 8:15 am.

"Mami ..." Anna called her attention.

"Tell me baby."

"¿Dónde está Doc Brie?" (_"Where is Doc Brie?"_)

Marco pulled out the syringe cap and approached to Anna.

"NO!" Anna shouted towards the nurse and hid herself under the blanket. "Yo no quiero ese tipo! Quiero Doc Brie! Quiero a ella, sólo a ella!" (_"__I don't want __that guy! __I want Doc Brie! I want her, just her!"_) Anna's voice came muffled and unintelligible.

"Anna, ¿qué pasa? Es sólo una extracción, no hay que tener miedo! Tú has hecho muchos... " (_"Anna__, what's happening it'__s just __a blood sample__, you don't have to __be afraid! __You __have made __many... "_) Santana walked over to Anna and sat back down on the bed placing the phone on the nightstand. She stroked her daughter's head covered by the blanket trying to calm her down and Anna pulled her head out. Santana saw that she was crying and gave her a kiss on her forehead. "Hey..."

"No quiero Mami, por favor, no me haga sacar sangre!" (_"__I don't want __Mami, __please don't __make me __take blood__!"_) Santana felt her heart become very little and then release and expand in her chest. She would have done anything to be in her shoes, but she fucking couldn't "Honey you have to..."

"You know that after I have a gift for you!" The nurse said to the girl.

"Yo no quiero nada de ti! No me tienes que tocar! Tú eres malo y yo no te quiero! Malo! Malo!" (_"__I don't want __anything from you__! __You don't __have to touch __me! You're __mean __and I don't __want you! Mean__! __Mean__!__"_)

Anna yelled to the guy who immediately looked at Santana in disbelief and put the cap on the syringe.

"Hey you, what kind of words are you using?"

"I don't want him, no!"

Santana tried to grab her daughter's arms attempting to calm her down, her little chest rising and falling furiously and Santana was scared because it wasn't a good thing, the girl shouldn't fidget that way.

"Anna please calm down, tell me what's wrong honey!"

"I want Doc Brie, I want her I don't want that guy!"

She pointed at Marco who was starting to understand what was happening and tried to intervene in the conversation "Doc Brie can't take your blood!"

"NOOOO, I want her!" And she started to sob and her breathing became even shorter.

"Get out of this room, please! You're not helping!" Santana yelled the nurse because, seeing her daughter flustered, she was unable to hold back her agitation and her hands started to sweat.

"Ma'am I'm going, but the child has to blood sampling and Brie can't ..."

"I want Doc Brie!" Anna kept crying.

"Anna stop crying, the doctor cannot come, you heard the nurse. She no longer works here. She's gone!"

"It is not true! You're lying! Go away you too!"

Santana was exasperated and didn't know what to say and what to do, her daughter was starting to have serious trouble breathing and she wasn't able to make her stop crying and actually she was making things worse because instead of soothing her she was getting her nervous even more and she was getting herself nervous even more and the nurse was trying to calm them both and ...

"STOP ANNA!"

Santana shouted. Anna looked hurt at her mother and stood still for a few seconds, then she went out of bed swiftly and went to hide under it crying.

"Where is her?" Santana asked furiously at Marco.

"I-I ... don..."

But before he ended she left the room.

Brittany had arrived in the department stopping at the front desk, as she did every morning. She liked talk with Iolanda. Iolanda was a lady in her sixties, with red short and curly hair puffed over her head. Her face was skinny and her body was little and slender and she had a pair of bifocal glasses on the tip of her nose.

It was 28 years that Iolanda worked in that department, behind the front desk, even when the hospital was still in the old building in the city center. She knew everything about everybody, and had a particular obsession of reminding birthdays of doctors, nurses and sometimes patients. The hospital was her second home.

"Buongiorno Iolanda, niente di nuovo stamani?" (_"Good morning __Iolanda, __nothing new __this morning?"_)

"Il corridoio nord è in subbuglio mia cara Brie!" (_"__The __north hallway __is in turmoil __my dear __Brie!__"_)

No, not the north hallway. "Perché?" (_"Why?"_)

Iolanda tapped her index finger a couple of times on her ear and then pointed toward the north hallway that was right in front of the desk. Brittany listened as the woman suggested to her and heard. Screams and cries came from the room down the hallway and she knew exactly who was in that room: it was the room that she wanted to avoid more than anything else in the world that morning.

"Povero Marco, non gli poteva capitare genitore peggiore, quella donna pare uscita direttamente dal quinto cerchio dell'Inferno!" (_"Poor __Marco, __he have a really hard nut to crack__, that woman __seems to __come straight __from the Fifth __Circle of Dante's Inferno__!"_)

The moment Brittany turned to Iolanda to ask for an explanation of what was happening, Santana came out of the bedroom door. Brittany saw her stop right outside the door jamb, looking around a couple of times and then tighten her eyes on her. Brittany felt Santana's eyes beneath her skin, and blood concentrated on her face. Santana was angry, she walked quickly towards Brittany who, at that moment, realized that she was looking right for her. Santana approached and Brittany instinctively took a step backward and collided with her back against the counter hitting a pile of medical files resting on there and forcing Iolanda to dive stretching out her arms to avoid a disastrous fall.

"Bambina mia, guarda di stare più attenta!" (_"My child__, try __to __be more careful__!"_) Iolanda advised her but Brittany wasn't listening because she was focused in trying to understand what was that fury Santana had in her eyes. It reminded her of a documentary she had seen once with Bryan. When he was a child Bryan loved documentaries on animals and even she liked them a lot, both liked to discover strange things about every kind of animal that existed on earth, except insects, Bryan couldn't stand insects. In a particular documentary a mother Doberman was growling uninterruptedly to her owner who tried to fondle her while she was nursing her puppies. That dog had the same scared and furious look Santana was wearing now. It was frightening.

As soon as Santana was two meters away from Brittany she pointed her forefinger at her and told her, raising her voice without even worrying about being in a hospital on early morning: "You have to fix it!" Then she shifted her forefinger to her daughter's bedroom door.

"Sembra proprio che ce l'abbia con te!" (_"It looks like __she__'s got it __with you!"_) Iolanda noticed from behind her glasses.

"What?" Brittany asked flattening even more against the counter and arching her back, not being able to go back further than that. But Santana, without answering, joined her and grabbed her arm above the elbow and started to pull her towards the bedroom. Santana held her so hard that Brittany already felt her forearm tingle for the lack of blood supply.

"Santana stop! You're hurting me!" For the second time. The second time she met her and the second time she hurt her. Brittany tried to shake off Santana, off that bite that could rip the skin from her bone by how strong it was.

"No me importa una mierda! You made eso, you're a doctor, es tu trabajo, y ahora you fix it!" she whispered angrily turning to her and bringing her face just inches away from her, always squeezing her arm and then turning back to the door and pull her into the room behind her.

Here comes Santana Lopez, the bitch, the one who can't control her rage, the one that goes around spitting judgments on everyone she meets, the one that gives swearwords as if they were candy. Here Santana Lopez, the one that Brittany didn't know at all. How could she be so blind in the past. Everyone had told this to her, especially her parents: Santana wasn't a good person; but she thought she knew the real Santana, the one that hid her sweetness and her frailty beneath violence and jokes and shit. But maybe the others were right, maybe they really knew Santana, not her, and maybe Santana was another thing on which Brittany had been naive.

When they were in the room Santana left her arm and Brittany rubbed where soon she would have a pretty big bruise, while hearing sobbing. Santana pointed to the empty bed. Marco was next to the bed on all fours with his head down and was trying to reassure someone. As soon as he felt the presence of the two women he looked up at them then turned to Brittany. He spoke with a smile, trying to hide with his look the words, he was sure, the brunette would not understand "Menomale sei arrivata! Questa donna non ha tutte le rotelle a posto! Mi stavo davvero spaventando!" (_"Thank goodness __you came__! __This woman's got __a screw loose__! __I was __really __scared__!__"_).

"Che è successo?" (_"What happened__?"_) Brittany asked still rubbing her arm and leaning under the bed too to see Anna curled up on the floor, sitting with her arms wrapped around her legs and her face buried on her knees, jolting to any hiccups.

"Sono venuto a prelevarle il sangue, ma ha cominciato a dire che voleva te, io ho provato a dirl..." (_"I came __for __the blood sample, but __the girl started saying __that she wanted __you, __I tried to __tell her ...__"_).

"Just stop talking a language I can't understand!" Santana blurted looking at the two with one arm wrapped around her chest and the other hand slapping the air. The two looked back at her.

"Non ti preoccupare, ci penso io adesso, a tutte e due, tu stai qua e te lo dico io quando è il momento di prenderle il sangue, ok?" (_"Don't worry__, I got it __now, __I'll take care of both of them, __you stay __here and __I'll tell you __when it's time __to take her __blood, __right?__"_) Brittany reassured Marco and he looked at the brunette whose chest was raising and lowering heavily while she was glancing at the blonde. She looked like a bull in the arena the moment before attacking the bullfighter.

"I guess you didn't understand me!" Santana said to a Brittany who snapped her head toward her and confronted her, face to face, without a moment of hesitation.

Do you want to be a bitch to me? Well, I'll be a bitch to you. Tit for tat. Brittany thought as she watched Santana straight in the eye. She could be bitchy too now, not that she liked it, not that she did it often, but she had found, experiencing, that sometimes people need to be a bit assholes, just to remind the rest of the world that she existed and she wanted to find a place in the world too.

"Yes Santana, I did! I understood you very... very... well!"

She articulated quietly the last three words pausing them with a moment of silence and then turned back to the bed while a shudder ran down her spine and she didn't identify if it was a thrill of anger, frustration or just pride. But she distinctly heard the slight laugh Marco tried to turn into a cough when the brunette glared at him, afraid she took it with him.

Brittany lay down on the floor and put the upper part of her body under the bed.

"Hi!"

Hearing the woman's voice the girl raised her head immediately. "Go away!" she said and then plunged back it in her knees crying even louder.

"You're not serious, are you?" Anna raised her head slightly revealing only the eyes and looking at the woman.

"What happened?" Brittany asked softly.

"He want to take my blood!"

"Oh! Do you mean he's a vampire?" Brittany whispered with a stunned and amazed expression in her face.

Anna thought for a moment to the question that the woman, an adult, had just made to her. Adults usually said over and over that monsters and vampires and ghosts didn't exist, right? Then she answered this time showing the rest of her face and frowning eyebrows. "No Doc Brie, vampires don't exist! He's just a nurse!"

"Oh ..." Brittany smiled and even her eyes smiled and Anna wanted to smile too, but she didn't. "He's just a nurse! Hey do you remember?" Brittany asked approaching a little more to that ball of little girl stroking her foot with the tip of her forefinger "I told you that in this hospital everyone's nice, and Marco is a really nice guy! I know him and he've got really light hands and you're really lucky 'cause..." she threw her head from side to side as if to see that no one was listening and whispered "...he's the best here, he's not like Miss Coletti, she's a bit fat and she have huge and rough hands and I'd never ever let her take my blood. But well, Marco is cool"

"Can you just take her blood and stop with all this show?" Santana said, annoyed. It was the easiest, Anna wanted Brittany. Brittany had arrived. Why she keep on involving that Marco?

The woman's voice reached the four ears under the bed and Anna rolled her eyes. Brittany smiled at the similarity of expression with her mom. God, they looked like so much. Outside she was the miniature version of Santana and if so was inside, she had to pull out all her charm to persuade her to take the blood sample. Anna sniffed.

"Hey, listen, can we just go upstairs!" She gestured with her forefinger pointing to the base of the bed above them. "I'm tall and I just hurt my arm, and so this is a little awkward and uncomfortable posture for me now! Can we keep talking on your bed?" Anna looked at her puzzled. "I promised that nobody will take anything from you, if you don't want. Promise!" Brittany waited without betraying any emotion from her face. She didn't want to pray the little girl, she wanted that was her own decision.

"Ok!"

"Yay! I'll help you to get out." And Brittany reached for the girl who grabbed her hand and let herself be dragged out by the woman. Soon as they were out Anna threw her arms around Brittany's neck and she lifted her from the ground. Santana took a step toward them. Brittany had just took her daughter in her arms. Brittany had took her daughter in her arms!

Anna didn't let go until she was sitting on the bed. She was quiet now, she wasn't crying anymore and Santana walked up to her, not much, just another step. She didn't like it. She didn't like that her daughter was hobnobbing with Brittany, she didn't like that Brittany had been able to calm her down when she made her only agitate even more. She didn't like how Brittany talked to her little girl and touched her and smiled at her and looked at her. That was her job, she was the mother and she had to stand next to her daughter and comfort her and make her smile. Brittany had nothing to do with them.

"Honey, why now don't you leave them take your blood and let the doctor get back to her job so you and I can spend the rest of the morning playing Farm girl!"

Anna pouted as soon as Santana finished speaking. She didn't want Brie to go away, she was angry with her mother because she had screamed and yelled at her. Santana saw the girl and went back a step. Brittany saw the girl and put her right hand on her little chest pushing her to lie down. The girl lie down and Brittany started to fondle her making circles with the open palm just above her heart. She retake the attention of the girl and smiled. Anna sniffed and listened to the blonde.

"Look, let's make a deal, shall we?"

"What deal?"

"Ok!" She settled back on the bed continuing to stroke the girl's chest with a slow pace and a gentle pressure.

"You say that Marco here is not good and maybe you think he's going to hurt you while I think the opposite, so if you win and Marco will hurt you, you can ask me anything!"

"Anything?"

"Uh uh!" Brittany nodded.

"Can I ask you also to bring me to Disneyworld!"

"Of course!"

"Can I ask you to buy me a whole bucket of ice cream?"

"I've said you can ask everything!"

"I like it! And if you win?"

"Ok, if I win ..." Brittany thought about something special she could ask to the little girl.

"I can't bring you to Disneyworld!" Anna said thoughtfully, frightened by the idea of having to do something too big for Brittany.

Brittany giggled "Ok, I got it: if I win, when you'll be out of this hospital I want you to come and visit me in my house!"

"In your house? And why? "

"The questions later, now tell me if you're in?"

Anna stretched out her hand to Brittany "I'm in!" Brittany took her hand and shook it vigorously making the child laugh.

"Then you have to roll up your sleeve and rest your arm on the bed and never look ... EVER ... on the side of Marco. The rest is all him!" She turned to the nurse and nodded to Marco, who immediately approached the girl. Anna replied the frightened look she had before. "Now?"

But Brittany didn't stop to smile and nodded. "Trust me!"

Anna pulled up her left sleeve and looked at the nurse approaching the bed. She moaned and pouted.

"Hey Anna I told you not to look other side. Look at me!"

Brittany got out of bed and knelt on the right side of the bed, resting her arms folded on the mattress and leaning her head on her arms, so that Anna was forced to turn her head completely in the opposite direction of the nurse.

"Do you like ducks?" Brittany asked.

"Ducks? I don't know, they're cute! "

Anna felt the tourniquet tighten on her arm and instinctively she turned her head back to the nurse but Brittany stopped her grabbing her chin and forced her to look at her again.

"Have you ever fed the ducks?"

"No ..." Anna said moaning.

"Really your parents never took you to feed the ducks?"

"Uh-uh!" Anna shook her head.

"So we have to fix it! You know that at my house I have a pond full of ducks?"

"Really? Real ducks?"

"Of course, I have seven! And there are two swans that maybe this year will conceive some ugly ducklings!"

"You're not kidding me?"

"Of course not, you'll see by yourself when you'll come to me! And you know that the pond is full of water lilies that bloom in late spring and the lake is covered with pink and yellow flowers, and then there is a family of squirrels on the chestnut tree that overhangs the lake, now they are dormant, but when the spring begins they leave the hole on the shaft and go around my garden with their little legs. And then I also have three cats they don't often come close to the pond, but there are days that they hide behind the chestnut tree and wait for some ducks walking nearby and then they jump off and want to play with them but duks run away scared. Oh, and then in my room there is a terrace overlooking the pond and from there I can also see the forest which begins at the end of the pond and I can swear that every night there's some animals that comes from the woods to drink at the pond; a couple of nights ago I got a family of deer and you gotta believe me, the puppy looked up towards the terrace and I swear he greeted me with his head!"

"Are you kidding?"

"No, I told you, I'm not, it's all true!"

"Then I want to lose, I want to come to your house!"

Brittany opened her smile, "You already lost young lady!"

Anna turned around immediately and Brittany stopped stroking her chest. The nurse was holding a test tube on which he was writing something and on the metal cart there were two other tubes one small and one larger, all of them filled with her blood. She looked at her arm and there was no tourniquet but there was a nice patch with Mickey Mouse and Goofy chasing each other. Anna looked at Brittany fascinated and confused and her face was asking the woman how she made that spell. Anna, closed in the bubble that Brittany had meticulously built for her, hadn't felt the tourniquet, she hadn't felt the needle, she hadn't felt the rubbing of alcohol wipes and not even the patch, she hadn't seen her mother move nervously as the needle pierced her skin and not even close her eyes and increase her breath at the sight of blood, what she always saw each time she get a blood sample. Brittany was a sorceress, maybe a fairy? If she lived in a place like that she must have been a fairy. Because fairies are blondes, Anna had always imagined them blond and blue-eyed like Brie. Anna laughed and threw back her arms around her fairy's neck popping a wet kiss on her cheek! "So does that mean you'll take me to your home? It wasn't just a joke to make me stay calm?"

Brittany pulled her eyes off the girl and threw it to Santana who was looking at the two and Brittany didn't wait for the mother to give her permission, she reached for the nightstand next to her and grabbed a phone. Santana again stepped forward as if to stop her, but Brittany glared at her. Meanwhile, Marco had left the room, but none of the three had noticed it or had noticed his absence.

"It's your mom's this phone?"

Anna nodded. "Why?"

Brittany unlocked the phone and wrote there a number "I save my mobile number, a deal is a deal, and you can call me when you want to remind me our deal. And if you need anything else!"

"You can also put your picture in?"

"Do you want my picture in?"

"YEEEEES!"

Anna hopped on the bed until Brittany grabbed her and held her close nearing their faces and taking a picture at both. The two looked at it and laughed then decided to taking another one, because in the first Anna was all blurry and Brittany had half an eye closed. The second picture was really pretty and they were both very satisfied. Brittany saved that picture in her contact. Anna was excited and looked at that picture chuckling. Brittany glanced at Santana. She was watching them, absent, motionless, with no emotion that transpired on her face or her eyes.

"I have to go now!"

Brie said back to Anna.

"No ... already?"

"There are other children in the hospital and it wouldn't be fair at all I stay with you all day!"

Anna thought for a moment about what the woman had just said. "You're right Doc Brie!"

Brittany nodded "Remember that everyone here is cool!" She came up to her ear whispering "Everyone but Miss Coletti!" and she laughed and gave the girl a kiss on her cheek. Anna blushed and giggled throwing herself into the bed and taking the phone in front of her eyes watching again the photo of her and her new friend.

Brittany walked away from the bed and walked over to Santana. She relaxed her face's muscles, she had smiled until that moment, she had done it for the child, but now she was beside Santana who hadn't moved yet from that position if not for a few steps in their direction and she still had her arms folded and a icy gaze on her face and Brittany would have paid gold to know what was going through her head, how she felt, what she felt. But Santana looked down when Brittany passed her, to lift her gaze back blankly into space when Brittany came so close to her that their shoulders touched and Brittany froze and turned to Santana.

"You can use it yourself, I mean, if you want... to talk ... with me ..."

"I have nothing to say and I don't want to listen to you."

Brittany pursed her lips, sighed and nodded. Santana clearly heard her sigh. Why was she doing that? Why was she hurting her again? Yet it was exactly what she wanted to do to her. She smelled skin and white musk. She wanted to hurt her.

"Ah ... and ... Santana ..."

Santana like before didn't move, didn't move her eyes, didn't move a muscle.

"... I'm not a doctor!"

And she left the room.


	6. Chapter 6

CHAPTER 6

Santana looked at her daughter for a moment without changing expression. Maybe she had misunderstood what the woman had just said. The anger began to scratch her chest. She allowed Brittany to get closer her daughter because she believed she was a doctor and therefore she believed that she had all the credentials to work in a hospital with that fame. But if she wasn't a doctor... Santana felt betrayed and humiliated and duped.

"Do you mind if I go out for a minute?" She asked the girl.

Anna shook her head without looking at her, but smiling and giggling, focused on her Mami's phone. She was trying to remember how to send a picture. She knew how to write a text, her mother had taught her and had taught her to write something too. Since she had stopped going to kindergarten, because of her illness, her mother was teaching her to read and write. She wasn't very good, but definitely she wanted aunt Rach to see her new friend. Aunt Rach surely would have liked Doc Brie, and who would not like her! It seemed that just her Mami didn't like her. Maybe she should also send the picture to uncle Kurt and aunt Quinn too and even grandparents! But first she had to remember how to insert the picture in the text. She didn't hear her Mami leave the room because at that moment she noticed the camera icon next to the space where to write texts.

"Got it!" She clicked on the icon and other writings appeared "Ugh!" Anna couldn't read very well, so she tried pressing on the first writing, but her face appeared from the front camera's lens, so she annulled and made the whole procedure over again this time clicking the second option and finally the folder with all the pictures appeared, and she carefully chose one of the two picture of her and Doc Brie, the one in which both were smiling and she wrote something under the photo. Then she clicked the send button.

Santana rolled out of the room and went toward Brittany who was striding toward the front desk. "Hey!" she shouted reaching out to her shoulder, but she had not time to touch her since Brittany, heard the words, immediately stopped and turned toward her. Santana halted her steps in time before collapsing on the blonde.

"What?" Brittany replied not hiding her disappointment in her voice.

"What are you trying to do?" Santana asked, waving her hands and shaking slightly her head. Brittany knew very well that language the woman's body was speaking at that moment: her chin rising up defiantly, hands snapping up and forward ready to attack, her head bobbing sharp; she had listened to that language many times, she had hated and blamed it every time Santana had used it against someone, she had respected it every time she had defended, with it, Brittany or herself. But now that language was talking right to her, for the first time, and Brittany didn't know what to do, didn't know how to react, what to feel, she didn't think she could understand it. She was wrong, though. She understood it perfectly and oddly she wasn't as scared as she might have been in the past. She was not angry, she was almost excited and couldn't explain why, but that face a few inches away, that body leaning toward her screaming its own language, were much more comforting then the frost and motionlessness that she was used to see in those past two days.

"Again. What?" And the only way Brittany managed to answer Santana was facing her in turn, as she wasn't accustomed to do, but she liked that, the adrenaline made her blood run at an incredible speed that was noisy pumping in her heart. She remembered all the times she had suggested to Santana to be quiet, to stop the violence, to be kind, but not now, she was challenging her, because she liked it. She liked the attention Santana was giving her, she liked her body close to her, she liked her deep brown eyes fixed straight in hers. Their spark.

"What? You're asking me what? I'm wrong or you just said to me you're not a doctor?"

"I'm not!" Brittany replied in a quiet voice, but her gaze was fierce and a shiver ran through Santana's back. Santana thought it was anger. She was challenging her?

"You're a nurse, so? A paramedic? A kinesiotherapist? An anesthesiologist? A dentist? A pharmacist? A damn psychologist?" Opinionated and cocky Santana continued her battle and another shudder shook to Brittany's reply.

"I'm not!" Brittany answered and Santana lifted her hands up and then down. God, how she wanted to grab the woman by her arms to slam her against the wall and slap her.

"So why the fuck you're in this hospital dressed like a doctor e hanging about children rooms?"

"What do you want Santana?"

"I want a fucking answer from you! Why do you slip in my daughter's life pretending to be a doctor?"

"I'm not pretending anything, you just supposed I was a doctor…"

"Well you were acting like a doctor yesterday and when you came here this mor…"

"I didn't came, you dragged me here begging for my hel…"

"I never begged anyone in my life…"

"Hey stop!" The voice came from somewhere between them and the front desk. The two women at the same time turned to Roy that was looking puzzled at them.

"This is an hospital, a children hospital and you're shouting and swearing!"

Brittany dyed her cheeks red and looked down, then closed her eyes trying to calm her breath, but then returned her gaze to Santana. Her jaw was clenched and muscles were trembling just below her cheek bone. She shifted her gaze to Santana's lips. It was like when she had seen for the first time Botticelli's Venus.

She had entered the Uffizi Gallery reluctantly. Her father had been there before, more than once, it was one of the first things he had done just arrived in Tuscany. See the Uffizi had been one of his biggest dreams. While living in America, he had a basement full of canvases and brushes and colors and when she came in in there the oil tempera's mellow smell came straight in her stomach. He loved painting. But Brittany didn't care too much: museums were just a bunch of confused paintings and statues made by a mixture of dead men. It was all confusing. But her father had insisted so much and one day, Bryan was about four years old, he had taken Brittany and Bianca and brought them to the Uffizi Gallery. She had gone there bored and angry with her father because she really didn't want to do this tour of the museum; she had crossed the first rooms in a sort of negative bubble, catching only the bad things around what she saw like the tiring procession of madonnas and sacred altar pieces, the repetitive gold color, the crowding of figures on one plane and she had just caught something of what her father told her about humble men with a great mind and rich clients and search for truth. Then they had stopped at the entrance to another room. Brittany was the last in the row, in front of her Bianca was excited and hung on her father's lips who kept talking and talking and gesticulating, and his eyes shone and he had a stupid smile on his lips. And while the two were entertained in their cultured discussion, Brittany had bowed her head to the right to look in the room behind her father's shoulders and try to figure out why the man was creating such suspense and she had seen a huge painting of a dozen painted figures. Even if she was far she recognized a man on the left, three women with their fingers intertwined in a kind of circle, other female figures, a blue flying man at the left and a cupid at the top. She giggled to herself, who knew what the painting meant, the blue man could very well be a superhero, and at least it wasn't another madonna. Then they entered the room and her father had turned their attention to the painting in the middle of the left wall. And she had seen her. She was immense and breathtaking. Nude Venus with her body bent like an apostrophe, covered only by her hand and her blond hair, not at all modest with her round breasts and her white skin. And in that moment what her father was telling had become the most beautiful story she had ever heard: the journey of Venus on a shell driven by the winds Zephyrus and Aura, the roses raining down from the sky, the silk mantle embroidered with daisies. Brittany had been able to see everything, every brush stroke, the texture of the canvas, the rosy shades on cheeks and nose, the hair that seemed drawn one by one, the deep shadow of the lips. Then her visit had been a discovery of art and beauty, and she had been out of that museum with shining eyes and a stupid smile on her lips just like her father. She had never seen anything like that, or perhaps she had never understood.

Santana was now in front of her, the most beautiful work of art, and her slightly protruding upper lip, and the thread of the shadow of her lower lip at the top of her chin, seemed drawn, sculpted, written by the desire of an artist in search of his soul, because this is an artist, is the one who first of all desire, and in his desire he look for beauty and with crazy calm and patience in the swirl of inspiration he seeks the soul inside himself in every line, every blow of hammer, every stroke, every word, every note. Brittany was overwhelmed by the desire to draw those lips, which were so familiar and yet so ethereal as a dream, draw the outline with the tip of her fingers, color them again with hers, with her nose, with her tongue, with her breath.

Santana turned and saw them, she saw Brittany's eyes on her lips and moved them, imperceptibly, unconsciously. Brittany's gaze slid across her face and stood over her eyes and Santana saw them again, Brittany's eyes, shimmering, enchanting. And Santana felt the tightness that had squeezed her the last two days, completely abandon her, she stood empty, without breath, without thoughts or emotions, blinded by the light of blue eyes. She stepped forward, an involuntary reflex, a movement habit of the past, to the time that the spell of those eyes flustered her with desire and sweetness, and fatally attracted her to their owner's body. Taking another step, another step again and she could touch her, feel her, drink her, taste her, she closed her eyes. Anger. Anger. Anger. She forced herself to feel just that feeling, nothing more. Brittany would not bewitched her again, not now. Never again. The woman in front of her stopped to provoke her, to challenge her, to fight, and she was standing there, motionless, helpless and silent waiting for something that Santana was sure she wouldn't have given her again. She opened her eyes and Brittany was still there, she seemed so small, fragile, defenseless and at the same time so powerful and noble, as a thoroughbred and as her breath quickened again and crossed loud her nose, Santana again wanted to slam her against the wall and beat her and scratch her and bite her and get inside her to hear her scream, to hurt her. Fuck, she had to get her out of her way, of her head, she had to restrain those sick thoughts, she had to make her disappear again, as she had done for the last fifteen years.

"Sa ..." Brittany started, but "NO!" Santana replied sharply, "You're not allowed to see my daughter anymore and I don't care what ridiculous work you're doing in this fucking hospital!" Santana whispered dangerously approaching the other woman before turning to the left and move towards her daughter's room.

Brittany stepped back and leaned against the hallway wall placing a hand on her forehead then sliding it on her hair. When Roy walked up to her he caught her eye snapping two fingers up to her face and she took control of what was happening around her and realized that not only Roy, but Iolanda at the front desk, a couple of nurses and another couple of parents which appeared at their children's bedrooms' doors, had stopped to observe the scene. "Vieni" (_"Come on..."_) Roy said to her, running a hand in her back and pushing her away from the wall, then driving her through the hallway to his office. Brittany let him walk her dropping her eyes directed on her own feet trying to avoid the eyes of those watching her that were running through her skin. The two didn't say a word until they were locked in Roy's office, who quickly faced Brittany. "Che diavolo era quello Brie? Un litigio? Te stavi litigando con quella donna? Te…litigando? Porca puttana la tensione era alle stelle fra di voi!" (_"What __the hell was that __Brie? __A fight__? __You__ were __arguing with __that woman? __You ...__fighting? __Holy shit __the __tension was sky high __between __you two!"_)

Brittany dropped in one of the office chairs sighing and immediately Roy sat next to her in the other chair. "Non la sopporto!" (_"__I can't stand her!"_) She let her out. "Che cosa? Brie, ma che ti prende? Tu sei quella del sorriso sempre sulle labbra, dell'accettare tutti per quello che sono, dell'amare i difetti degli altri, del trovare sempre il buono in ogni situazione e in ogni persona, sei la fottuta Pollyanna del terzo millennio e in due giorni ti ho vista sconvolta, ferita, triste e soprattutto ti ho visto litigare. Ma chi è quella donna? Che ti ha fatto?" (_"What? __Brie, __but __what's wrong? __You're the __one with smile __always __on your lips, __the one who accepts __every one __for who they are__, __who loves __the defects of others__, who __always finds the __good __in every situation and __in every person__, you're the __fucking __Pollyanna __of the third millennium __and in two __day __I saw you __upset__, hurt, sad __and above all __I've seen you __fighting. __But who's __this woman? __What did she do to you__?"_)

Brittany got exasperated and started to pace back and forth gesturing heatedly as she spoke. "Lei crede di venire qui e dopo quindici anni sconvolgermi di nuovo la vita? E forse crede che glielo permetta anche? Viene qui, nel mio ospedale, nel posto dove lavoro e sono rispettata per quello che faccio e mi fa sentire un'incapace, mi insulta, mi colpisce, mi urla e crede anche che io me ne stia zitta. E poi mi fa sentire in colpa, perché lo so, è subdola, ma io la conosco bene, e solo guardarla così gelida mi fa sentire in colpa, sono quindici anni che mi porto il fardello dei sensi di colpa e arriva lei e sembra un cane bastonato e rabbioso, come se lei non mi avesse fatto male, come se lei non mi avesse tenuto fuori dalla sua vita, come se lei non mi avesse lasciato prima di lasciarla io, e poi ha una figlia…con Finn Hudson te ne rendi conto, perché non me ne so capacitare…Finn Hudson! Come può essere possibile!" (_"__She thinks to __come here __and after fifteen years __put upside down __my __life again__? __And maybe she __even think __I let __her__? __She comes __here, __in my hospital__, __in the place __where I work __and I am __respected for what __I do and __she makes me feel __an incompetent__, __she insults me__, she hits me__, __she yells at me __and __she __also believes that __I will __shut up__. __And then she __makes me feel guilty __because __I know she's __sneaky, __but __I know her well__, __and __just looking at her who's so cold __makes me feel __guilty, __it's __fifteen years __that I carry __the burden of __guilt and __she comes __and looks like a __crestfallen __and rabid dog__, as if __she hadn't __hurt __me__, __as if she __hadn't kept __me __out of her life__, __as if she __hadn't left me __before __I __left her__, __and then she has a __daughter __with __Finn __Hudson__...__you realize __that__, because __I didn't __realize __it yet__... Finn Hudson! How may it be?"_) While Brittany kept talking, Roy stood to look at her trying to think about the words he had just heard, maybe he got it wrong, and yet she said it, Brittany said, 'se lei non mi avesse lasciato' (_'__if she __hadn't left me__'_) He stared at Brittany intensely, until she felt his eyes and paused.

"Che c'è? Che ho detto?" (_"What's it__? __What did I say__?"_)

"Brie che vuol dire 'se lei non mi avesse lasciato?'"(_"__Brie__, what_ '_if she __hadn't left me' means?"_)

Brittany turned purple "Chi l'ha detto? Io non l'ho detto!" (_"Who __said that? __I __didn't say that__!__"_)

"Brie?"

Brittany sank back in the chair and covered her face with her hands, "O mio Dio…" (_"Oh my __God__..."_) she whispered from her hands pressed to her mouth.

"Brie…"

Roy grabbed her wrists and pulled her hands from her face. Brittany was crying.

"Brie…"

"Non posso…Non l'ho mai detto a nessuno…qui…" (_"__I can't ... __I've never __told anyone__... here...__"_)

"Ok, non è niente, calmati…" (_"__Ok, it's nothing, calm down__..."_)

He grabbed her face and gently stroked her cheeks with his thumbs.

"Cominciamo dall'inizio, ok?" (_"Let's start __from the beginning. __Ok?"_) Brittany nodded.

"Chi è Santana Lopez?" (_"Who's __Santana __Lopez?"_)

Brittany slipped her lower lip between her teeth, and bit lightly, how could she explain who Santana Lopez was? She searched through the words she knew of the language that they were sharing, but couldn't find the right ones, there were not enough words to explain who Santana Lopez was in any language but in Italian she really couldn't find any, it was as if the new language that had become her language couldn't hold her past. "Can I…Posso parlare inglese?" (_"Can I__...__Can I __speak English?"_)

Roy nodded and took his hands off Brittany's face to let her talk, resting on her knees.

"She was…my everything. She was my best friend, my sister, my mother, my daughter, my lover, my partner, my milestone. We know each other in 7th grade and in Freshman we were best friends. We were both cheerleaders, we hang out together, we were always together. Then we started this…sort…of…thing…" She shrugged and felt the blood dye her face's and neck's skin "We started making out and other stuff, a lot of other stuff, just like a game, we were two of the most popular and hot girls of the school and everyone wanted to date us or just have sex with us and that was easy, but when she kissed me…when she touched me or looked me straight in the eyes, it wasn't easy at all. I fell in love with her…deeply… And she was that sort of angry bitch with everyone but me, she was sweet with me and she cared and she loved me back. And then I'm not to tell everything we've been through, but then she graduated and I didn't, and then she went to college and I still had to learn how to live by myself, without her and it was so painful, and then she left me, and it was more than painful…" Brittany shook Roy's hands and swallowed "She didn't want me to lose my school's last year to feel hurt for her absence, I think. But I couldn't stand to be alone and when I started to date…him…she came to take me back but…I was nobody, I had nothing to offer and she was so amazing, she had so many chances and wanted to throw it all away to be with me. I couldn't let her do this. She had to live her life and I left her and few months later I get pregnant, I moved here and then…well then you know… till…yesterday. That's it."

Roy didn't speak. He looked at her and said nothing. He didn't move, not even flapped his eyelashes. He looked at her and breathed and swallowed and nothing else. Brittany let the tears ran down her cheeks again. She knew it was really a big blow to his best friend. She knew she had lied to him, she had lied to everyone really, even to herself. But most of all to him. He had always been close to her. He had cared for her, much more than her parents had and she had lied to him. For all these years.

"Allora lei è… Il tuo grande amore americano dunque…non è un lui?" (_"So she's__... Your __Great American Love __so ...__is not a __man?"_)

Brittany shook her head.

"It's her. She is your Great American Love?"

Brittany nodded and a tear streaked her face. Roy stood up and this time he started walking back and forth frantically.

"Holy shit Brie, I'm your best friend, we've known for twelve years, we've been together four years, four years Brie, don't you think this is a detail you should have share with me?"

"I'm sorry ..."

"That's why you left me? What? Are you a lesbian or something?"

Brittany shook her head and raised her eyebrows closing his eyes. "What? You don't know the answer? It doesn't seem that hard!"

"Of course it's hard! It's much more complicated than that Roy! You Italians really like to simplify everything, to label things, you like to create coalitions and put you against each other if you don't feel the same way. You are so quick to judge and spitting remarks on others without ever look at yourself. It's all much more complicated than this..."

Roy stopped and ran a hand over his face. He had a fucking will to cry. "Brie..." He knelt in front of her and grabbed her hands squeezing them. "Avresti dovuto dirmelo." (_"You should have __told me."_)

"I know."

"Se lo avessi saputo…" (_"__If I had known __..."_)

"I know Roy."

"Non ti avrei mai…" (_"__I would never __..."_)

"I know!" She reassured him. And she knew what he meant. Brittany and Roy were together seven years before. And Roy was practically a father for Bryan. Since the day they met until now. Roy was always there for Bryan: every birthday, every school play, every performance, every holiday on the calendar, every time Bryan needed him and vice versa. Perhaps that was why Brittany had allowed him to love her. And Roy had loved her so much. She had felt protected with him, wanted, beautiful again and important, but after a couple of years they were together she had started to feel suffocated, every time he kissed her, especially whenever they made love she felt a sort of disgust in her stomach, she felt she was cheating on him because he loved her and she just, didn't. And when he had noticed that something was wrong, and when Bryan had told him that he had found his mother crying loudly in the bathroom and couldn't stop, Roy had loved her even more and had sworn her that he would have made her forget that Great American Love of her that still haunted her, because there wasn't a better man than him, he told her. No man would have loved her as much as he did, he said. No man would have loved Bryan as much as he did. And it was true. And the more he loved her, the more she felt bad for him, for Bryan, for Santana. And the more her guilt grew the more she couldn't stop living in that state. The fourth year Roy had asked her to marry him and she couldn't. She could no longer continue, and then she had left him.

"Mi dispiace, devo solo riprendermi dallo shock…io…è una notizia che non mi sarei neanche mai immaginato minimamente. E…scusami, sono uno stronzo!" (_"__I'm sorry, __I just have to __recover __from the shock__...__I__... it's __a story __that I'd __never even __imagined __at all. __And__...__I'm sorry, __I'm an asshole__!__"_)

"It's me who have to apologize."

Roy shook his head. "Lo so, sono italiano e mi piace etichettare le cose perché sono più semplici da comprendere, come quando metti in congelatore caraffe di sugo per la pasta e ci devi mettere sopra un'etichetta perché quando sono congelate sembrano tutte uguali. Ma non me ne importa niente cosa sei. Davvero…" (_"I know__, I'm Italian __and I like to __label things __because they are easier __to understand, as __when you put __in the freezer __jugs of __pasta sauce __and you __need to __put on __a label __because when they are __frozen __they all look __the same. __But I don't care __what you are. __Really ... "_)

Roy sat back down next to her and took her hands again. "Che hai intenzione di fare adesso?" (_"__What are you gonna __do now?"_)

"Io?…Niente! L'hai sentita, non vuole che mi avvicini a sua figlia, quindi, non lo so, prenderò qualche giorno di ferie dal lavoro e aspetterò che se ne vadano." (_"Me? ...__nothing! __You heard her__, __she doesn't want __me closer to __her __daughter, so __I don't know__, I'll take __a few days __off work __and __wait for __them to go away__.__"_) She closed her eyes because just the thought made her head spin.

"Non credo che qualche giorno basterà…" (_"__I don't think __that __a few days __will be enough..."_)

"Perché?" (_"Why?"_)

"Staranno qui un mese o forse un paio di mesi…" (_"__They'll be __here __a month or __maybe a couple of __months ..."_)

"Un paio di mesi? Che cos'ha la bambina?" (_"__A couple of __months? __What's wrong with __the baby?"_) Brittany asked, visibly worried.

"Deve fare una commissurotomia mitrale." (_"She have to do __a__ mitral __commissurotomy__."_)

"Ok, dillo più facile!" (_"__Ok, tell it __easier!__"_) She worked in the hospital for years, but she had never been very interested in children's diseases, she heard a lot of names every day, and children, but not all, liked to talk about their illness, such as when they show their scars. The disease becomes a feature, such as the name, or the city of origin. Brittany listened every day every kind of illness or discomfort or malformation, but without knowing them, because, for her, there were only children and not their diseases. Especially she didn't know the technical or medical terms, the names were so confusing.

"Replacing the mitral valves damaged by rheumatic fever with mechanics ones. An open-heart surgery."

"Oh my god, no! An open-heart surgery?"

"Yes!"

"Oh my god, no! She's so little! O my God! It's frightening! And I'm here wondering why Santana behave so badly with me ... I'm a horrible person! She should feel so bad! I'd die if that happened to Bryan. Oh my God!" Brittany started crying and Roy smiled. He knelt in front of her friend and hugged her tightening and stroking her head.

"I'm sorry Roy, I'm a really bad person, I hurt you without even giving you an explanation ... and I hurt her and it seems to me, that I continually hurt everyone. I'm a awful person!"

"Shut up, stop crying! It is not true ... You're a wonderful woman Brie! The best I know..."

Roy took her face in his hands and looked into those blue and red eyes.

"Make me a smile."

Brittany shook her head.

"Do you still feel something for her?"

Brittany shrugged. She hadn't yet asked herself this question and perhaps she didn't even need to ask it. It was Santana and she had always had feelings for her and it would be so for the rest of her life, yet she didn't know what those feelings were and she wasn't sure whether it was even possible to feel something for someone she hadn't seen in the previous fifteen years, maybe it was again the idea of her that made her think like that, perhaps she still felt something for the dream that had run after her all these years. "No, I don't even know her, but I loved her, truly, deeply loved her, she's always been my dream, so ... I don't know. It's... complicated..."

Someone knocked on the office door. Roy stood up and Brittany turned her chair toward the desk, with her back at the entrance to hide her face red from crying. She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater.

"Avanti" (_"__Come in."_) Roy said, and the door opened slowly and Sara stuck her head into the office.

"Buongiorno cari!" (_"Good morning __dear ones__!"_) Both greeted the girl, Brittany without turning her head and sniffing. "Iolanda mi ha detto che eravate qui. Brie, il Dottor Ranieri ti vorrebbe con sé nel giro di visite, per lo scambio di dottori. Tutto bene?" (_"I__olanda __told me __you were here. __Brie__, Dr. __Ranieri __wants you __with him for __daily rounds, __for the exchange of __doctors game. __Are you okay?"_)

Brittany turned her head slightly and smiled at Sara "Si…ehm…tutto bene, arrivo tra due minuti. Vorrei evitare il corridoio nord se a te e Mauro non dispiace." (_"Yeah ...__um ...__okay, __coming __in two minutes. __I would avoid __the __north hallway __if __you and __Mauro __don't mind."_)

"Ok, non ti preoccupare, ci pensiamo noi, Iolanda mi ha detto del tuo piccolo litigio con quella donna, e pensare che la prima volta che l'ho vista mi sembrava così carina e non potevo immaginare si rivelasse una…" (_"__Ok__, don't worry__, we got it, Iolanda __told me __about your little __fight with __that woman, and __you know __the first time __I saw her __she seemed __so cute and __I couldn't imagine __she turns out to be__a..."_)

"Sara, scusa, ci puoi dare due minuti e poi iniziamo il giro?" (_"Sara__, sorry__, __can you give us __two minutes __and then we begin __the rounds?__"_) Roy had seen Brittany's face while Sara was talking about Santana, she had turned her eyes down at her hands folded in her lap and she had kept holding her jaw focusing her attention to everything that wasn't her thinking.

"Si, scusate, vi aspettiamo al bancone." (_"Yeah, __sorry__, we are waiting for you __at the front desk.__"_) Sara closed the door behind her and Brittany moved her hands over her face pushing her palms into her eyes. She gathered as much air as she could in her lungs and then released. She stood up, straightened her hair and her clothes on and smiled at Roy.

"News travels fast in a hurry!"

Roy smiled.

"Ok, enough about my past. Let's go to work!"

Roy watched her as she came out of his office and slipped into the locker room to retrieve her coat and her work tools. They had met twelve years earlier in the 6:40 am Florence - Rome train. It was a Monday morning and he was on his way back to college after spending the weekend home: he was a senior of medical college at Catholic University. Brittany was a dancer and she was going to the Capital, to Cinecittà, to audition for a TV series. That day, Roy had found that she had moved to Italy for just two years and that she could speak Italian just for the small things that needed to survive in a foreign country. Roy had been immediately fascinated by her, by her beauty above all and in 2 hours and 42 minutes, the that the trip had lasted, even by her simplicity and her energy and her blue eyes that had the power to be amazed by everything he told and she didn't know, just like those of a child, eager to devour all the knowledge. He still remembered the huge amount of questions she had made about Italy, Rome, Florence, his college, his life, and he also remembered the questions to which she had answered about her trip to Italy, the fights with her parents, her child's birth and how she was proud when she talked about her son, but then he remembered also the questions she had avoided when he had asked her about herself and about Lima. He remembered that he had noticed a shadow in her eyes the moment when she had lost concentration on their conversation and her thoughts had flown in the wake of some memory that he wasn't allowed to know. Brittany so simple and so open yet so mysterious, Brittany yellow outside and purple inside, Brittany with the contagious smiles of a child and the seductive passion in her eyes, Brittany light and deep, Brittany frail and powerful, Brittany a beautiful contradiction. It had been so easy to fall in love with her. And yet it had been so difficult to break down her walls and win her trust. She had gotten the job and for a few months during the filming they had lived together and she had given him something of her life in America, little things, it happened especially when they listened to music together, there were songs that made her talk and made her told him little anecdotes, glimpses of a life that she was no longer allowed to live. Like that time when listening to 'Jump' by Van Halen, she had told him about an advertisement made for a mattress store and how the owner had prepared two trampolines that looked like two huge mattresses, on which she and her friends had jumped all day singing and laughing, trying to shoot the commercial. Or the time when MTV had broadcast the Mc Hammer video of the song 'U can't touch this', and she had broken out in a loud laugh pointing at the screen and telling him that they were just dressed the same when that day they had burst in the library singing and dancing on the benches. Or when listening 'We got the beat' of the Go Go's she told when they had performed in the lunchroom and at the end there had been a huge food fight and how she had enjoyed throwing pasta with tomato sauce and improvising dance moves sliding on the food on the ground. And then there had been a day when, while they were in a bar, the speakers were going through old American songs and Brittany was so excited, until the notes of a guitar solo had struck her ears and Roy had seen that shadow obscure her eyes and a sad smile had appeared on her lips, while a vibrant voice spoke about snow covered hills and mirrors in the sky. He had seen Brittany get lost in notes or in words or in memories and it was the first time she had spoken to him about her Great American Love. There had been other times since that day. She had spoken of stolen kisses, declarations of love, pinkies intertwined, songs danced, hugs and laughter and farewells, and broken hearts. They had come back from Rome at the end of that year. He had finished college in June and in the same month she had finished shooting and on the return journey from Rome to Florence, this time by car, with a trunk full of luggage and other things, he had understood that he had fallen in love with her and that he would do anything to drive away that shadow from her eyes, and make her forget her Big American Love. He would have loved and protected her as she deserved, he would have taken care of her and her child and would have made them happy. He knew he was the right man for her.

When she came out of the locker room she was no longer Brittany but she was Doc Brie and she had swallowed all her feelings as she usually did, leaving out the cheerful and joyful Brie.

"Ehi, cosa fai lì impalato?" (_"Hey, __what are you doing __standing there__?"_) Brittany said.

"Ti stavo aspettando. Andiamo va!" (_"I've been __waiting for you. __Let's __go!"_)

Brittany nodded and together they walked in silence to the front desk. Brittany loved Wednesday and rounds. Each entertainer was paired up with a doctor and while the doctor visited the children, the actors played funny jokes in the room to relieve tension and relax children and parents. And making the rounds with Dr. Ranieri was hilarious, because he looked like a clown, he had long white hair tied in two braids and wore shoes overly funny and colorful and he could do amazing magic tricks, so when they were together she was exchanged for the real doctor and he for the actor and together they improvised scenes of misunderstandings and misinterpretations as in the Commedia dell'Arte. When they arrived at the front desk Iolanda dropped her glasses on her nose and looked at Brittany's eyes warily, but didn't ask her anything and Brittany breathed a sigh of relief.

Doctors, nurses, and actors met and greeted friendly as ever and Yolanda gave the nurses a stack of medical records of patients that each doctor would visit. Dr. Ranieri took Brittany's arm and walked down the hallway east by agreeing on which of the two should "be the doctor." The front door next to the front desk opened and Brittany glanced that way and her heart stopped when she saw Finn Hudson come in and smile. It seemed that avoid the north hallway was not enough! Without thinking she turned her head away to avoid to exchange any kind of relationship with Finn, but a hot and heavy hand grabbed her by the arm, the arm that Santana had gripped and Brittany winced because it hurt. She turned around and Finn was there in front of her. She shook the man's grasp and this time it was easy.

"What do you want Finn, Santana has already banned me to get in touch with you or your daughter, what do you want from me again?"

Finn looked at her puzzled "I just wanted to apologize for yesterday Brittany." He smiled and went down the north hallway, leaving Brittany speechless.

* * *

Santana's phone, resting on the bedside table, began to vibrate the very instant when Marco came into the room with a small wheelchair. Since Santana had come back to her daughter's room she had convinced herself she had done with the blonde. This time for good. She wouldn't see her again, she would no longer heard about her. The only blond she needed in her life was Quinn. Anna greeted cordially the nurse while Santana threw an eye towards the phone to see who was calling. The name of Quinn appeared at the top of the screen, speaking of the devil! Santana made a quick calculation of what time must have been in that moment in New York: 4:30 am. What Quinn wanted at that time? But she didn't bother to answer because that wheelchair had to mean something.

"Hello again!" Marco greeted. Santana looked at her daughter, who now had a big smile on her face.

"Hello light hands Marco!" the little girl replied giggling at the nickname she had given the nurse. He replied with another smile. And then he turned to Santana telling her that Anna had to have chest x-ray. Santana nodded worried that her daughter, to the idea of another medical test, went on a rampage as a few hours before. The phone stopped vibrating.

"Honey, we have to go with Marco to have x-ray, ok?"

"Ok!" Anna got out of bed and walked over to her mother stretching her arms to get picked up.

"Hey Anna ..." Marco said shyly "What if, instead of standing in your mother's arms you sit in our super wheelchair, I'm an excellent driver, believe me!"

Anna looked at her mother who nodded and sat down in the wheelchair that Marco immediately reared up making her laugh. She looked like another child from that morning: she was relaxed and quiet and she didn't look at all scared. After all it had been a good thing that Brittany had come that morning. No. She had not to think about her. The phone started to ring again and again the name of Quinn appeared on the screen.

"Let's go Mrs. Lopez?" Marco asked and Santana grabbed the vibrating phone from the bedside table and put it in her jeans pocket following the nurse to the elevators.

"Hang on Anna, now we go into our x-ray cave!" And he pushed the wheelchair quickly followed by Santana. After all the nurse was not so bad. She thought that if she had decided to stay in that hospital despite everything she would have to trust more the staff.

The phone stopped vibrating but started again. If Quinn was calling so insistently perhaps something had happened? She started to worry a little, but tried not to think about it focusing on her daughter, she had already been distracted enough that morning.

"Hey Mami, you're too slow for us!" Santana smiled and step up the pace reaching the two who were already coming in the elevator.

The x-ray room was really in the basement of the hospital and Anna and Marco had struck up a conversation about how many children had got superpowers after x-rays and if there was a superhero that lived in the bowels of the hospital. Santana enjoyed the peace and lightness of the conversation without interfering and only when the child started to make a fuss because she didn't want to take off the pendant given to her by Brittany, she knelt down looking at her in the eyes.

"Why don't you give it to me a little bit? She..." she swallowed "...Doc Brie didn't give me anything, how about if I wear it at least until you have done?" Anna smiled at her mother, she took off her necklace and put it in her head. Slide the ribbon from her head was a little hard because it was narrow and Anna laughed at the funny faces her mother did while the wire shook her face. Finally though it adjusted perfectly to her neck and Anna greeted her mother as she entered the x-ray room with Marco. Santana remained alone and touched the pendant. She drove back memories of unicorns and took out her phone who was still vibrating.

"Quinn!"

"What the hell Santana?"

"What? You're ok?"

"Sure I'm ok! Why?"

"'Cause it's 4 am in New York now!"

"Yes, and?"

"And you're calling me unceasingly! What happened?"

"That's not the right question!" Quinn laughed on the other side. "Really Santana, Brittany?"

"What? Quinn are you drunk?"

"A little!"

"And why you're drunk in a Wednesday morning? You haven't work today?"

"And these are not even the right questions! The right question is: really, Brittany?"

Santana didn't answer, she didn't understand what was happening, why Quinn was asking her about Brittany? Was Quinn, her best friend, naming the unnameable? It was as if she knew... but she couldn't know what had happened in the last two days.

"What are you talking about?"

"Santana, you sent me a picture of your daughter with B.R.I.T.T.A.N.Y!" she articulated well every letter of that name, she unrolled it like a carpet in front of an incredulous Santana because finally after all those years she felt authorized to pronounce it.

"I didn't send you... what?" At that moment, Santana realized, the picture that Brittany had taken of herself and Anna! Now, for some unknown but predictable reason, that picture was in Quinn's phone. "Listen Quinn, I don't know how you have that picture. I can imagine that a couple of small and pretty darn clever little hands sneaked in something that they weren't allowed to and for this there will be consequences, but now you have to go to bed and maybe we'll talk about the picture when you'll get over all the vodka Martini's in your blood, okay?"

"Hey?" Quinn's voice was soft now, "Did you really meet her?"

Santana also softened, she didn't want to think about her, but maybe talk was not so bad. "Yes, she works here!"

"Oh my God San, how ...? How are you?"

"Good. Fine. I mean, I forbidden her to be seen by me again, so I'm fine. Now go to sleep Quinn, I know you need details and everything else, but we'll talk about it later, okay?"

"Okay, love you San."

"Bye Quinn!"

Anna left the x-ray room and Santana closed the phone call. The two people who had touched her phone that morning, besides her, were Anna and Brittany, and seeing that Brittany didn't have the time to send messages, the picture had been definitely sent by her daughter. Why was she again thinking about Brittany? She closed her eyes focusing on Anna, who was sadly sitting in the wheelchair with arms folded on her chest and with a pouting face and brow furrowed. Santana's blood found its way into her head: Marco. Again. What he did this time?

"What's wrong now?" And Santana didn't know who the two she was asking to. She expected that that nurse disappointed her again, that he had again disappointed her daughter, that he had made her angry, that he had hurt her. Because Santana expected this from people, she simply didn't trust anyone and nothing but herself and couldn't stand having to rely on someone.

But when Anna said, "I don't have super powers!" Santana burst into laughter. "Mami!" Anna scolded her but Santana was unable to stop laughing. She didn't want to disrespect her daughter, who seemed instead saddened by mother's reaction. But with that laugh Santana was throwing out all the tension piled in the past two days. The laughter became awkward and out of breath, and big tears came from her eyes. Watching that woman as she had a hand in her belly wiping her tears made Marco laugh too and Anna joined them and the three laughed the way to the elevator and without even knowing what they were laughing at, until Santana leaned down to her daughter, lift her from the wheelchair and picked her up as the elevator doors opened; she squeezed her as hard as he she could whispering in her ear "Te quiero muchisimoisimoisimoisimo!" (_"I love you __so so so __so so __much!__!__"_) Anna giggled. "And maybe it's too early to know if you received super powers! Maybe they'll come tomorrow, they always come after a good night's sleep!" The three continued to laugh.

When they arrived in the bedroom, Finn was waiting for them. "Papi!" Anna squealed throwing her hands towards her father who picked her up and she told him where they had been and what they had done in the morning. She also told him that she didn't want Marco to take her blood, and how Doc Brie made her change her mind and about the deal they had made and all the fascinating things she had described about her home. Santana reminded immediately the call to Quinn.

"Anna, honey, did you sent to aunt Quinn the picture of you and Doc Brie?"

"YES! I send it to aunt Rach and uncles Kurt and Blain and grandparents too!"

Santana's eyes widened "What did you do? It's not true, right?"

"Yes it is, why?"

"What picture are you talking about?" Finn asked and Santana ran her hands through her hair, trying to calm the anger that was rising in her chest and head. She couldn't blame her daughter she was only a child, a sick child, but she had to take it out on someone. She took a deep breath.

"This morning they have taken a picture together and Anna seems to have sent the photo to the whole family!" She explained to Finn and then spoke again to her daughter who was hiding in her father's hug because she knew exactly that her mom was going to scold her.

"Why you did that Anna? I said you thousand times not to play with my phone! It's a private thing!"

"I'm sorry I didn't think it was a bad thing. I'm sorry that I used your phone, I won't do it again, I promise!"

"You didn't have to send that photo Anna!"

"Why not? Doc Brie is my friend. I wanted everyone to know her! What's the problem, Mami?"

"They all already know her, this is the problem! You have to ask before using my or Papi's or everyone else's phone, ok?" Anna looked at her "Ok?" Santana asked her again and Anna nodded and then try to ask her mother "Why they all already know her?"

"Santana, it's just a picture!" Finn remarked careless.

"It's not just a picture Finn! It's…her, remember her? Do you remember what she did to me? It's hard enough to handle this situation, to stay here thinking that she's here too and try to avoid her, now I have to put up with all the phone calls asking me how I am and I'll have to tell them everything that happened and I'll have to listen to their suggestions on what's right or what's wrong to do and..."

Finn sat Anna on the bed. The girl's eyes were wide and serious, she realized she had done a bad thing, even if she was not sure what, but her Mami was nervous and when she was that way Anna knew that, what she had done had really upset her. Finn took Santana by the shoulders and forced her to look at him. "Santana, it's been fifteen years, we've all grown up since that time, we are no longer within the walls of McKinley High and Brittany is just a piece of the past, a memory, nothing else, for everyone. I don't think the others may see more than that now. Look at you. You're 34, you're a wonderful woman and a great mother. You got your own new soul band, you're associate professor at NYADA, you got a wonderful daughter, you've got a family who loves you, and a partner who, if you're with her, surly have some good feature!"

"Finn! There is no need that, every time, you all confirm that you don't like her!"

"What I mean is that past is past. A picture can't scare you!"

Santana smiled. She smiled to Finn's naivety, to his goodness and to the love he felt for her. Finn had been so good to her. So good that he had given her the greatest gift of her life. He had given her Anna. People say that a child is an act of love. Santana knew that many children born for quite other reasons. For chance, passion, loneliness, sorrow, gratitude, revenge, selfishness, hatred, habit, ingenuity, necessity. But Santana knew that she had been lucky enough to have given birth to a daughter thanks to love. And one of the purest loves that there may be, the unconditional and without passion and without ulterior motives love of friendship. And Finn was not the only one had given her that gift, Rachel had too. Finn and Rachel cared of her, and it was so overwhelming for Santana to think that someone cared so much of her to give her a child. And even if she made fun of them or was constantly angry with them, even if sometimes she still got back at Finn for that story of her outing and she forbade Rachel to speak loudly in her or Anna's presence, Santana felt so lucky. She had Finn and Rachel and Kurt and Quinn and Blain. But Finn didn't know, he didn't know that that wasn't just a picture. She stroked his arms. "Thank you." And then smiled to him.

"Now go to the hotel to take a shower and get some rest, okay?"

Santana nodded and walked over to the bed sitting on it.

"Are you mad Mami?"

"A little bit..."

"I'm sorry..."

"It's not your fault, don't worry!"

"Are you mad at me?"

"No mi vida, you just wanted to share the happiness to have found a new friend with someone who doesn't scream at you, right?"

Anna nodded. "Are you angry with her? Did she do something wrong? Why don't you like her? Why the others already know her? "

Santana looked for the right words to speak to her daughter and to herself. Maybe Finn was right, after fifteen years everything shall lapse, except that Santana couldn't feel that. "I'm a little angry with her, but not because of anything she did today or yesterday. We were..." Santana ran her tongue between her teeth taking time and finding a different word from that which had come to her mind "...friends, a long time ago and we had a fight and we never made peace."

"What a shame! You have to finally talk to her and make things right!"

"Maybe I will, okay?"

"Ok!"

Santana hugged the little girl pushing her onto the bed making her lie down on her back and falling on her. She rubbed her nose on her daughter's cheek and then gave her a light peck on the lips saying she was going a moment at the hotel.

"See you later mi amor!"

"Bye Mami!"

Santana gave her another kiss and got out of bed and, after saying goodbye again and collecting her things, she left the room, the department, the hospital and took a deep breath. The air of December went inside her nostrils and walked its way to her lungs freezing every inch of her respiratory organs. She caught the attention of a taxi parked at the entrance of the hospital that took her to the hotel. She dived in the room starting undressing before she closed the door. She threw her purse on the bed, took off her shoes, then her coat, then she closed the door, then took off the strap that bound her hair, the NYADA shirt, jeans, and as she walked toward the bathroom, she took off her bra and panties and when she came in she found herself naked in front of a mirror. She looked at herself. She had seen her body change so many times in more than 30 years. We are always on the move, even if we are still. She washed her hands and took off her contact lenses. She didn't want to see herself, she didn't want to see the time passed in her body, she didn't want to see anything around her she wanted to remain blurred for a moment, and she knew that, taking off her lenses, everything would have lost the clear shape of reality and the fuzzy contours would have made everything so fanciful, unreal. She opened the shower, waited for the water to be hot and slipped inside while her skin shook adjusting to the new temperature. Finn didn't know, he didn't know how much you can suffer when someone breaks your heart, and they break it without an explanation, without a logical reason, with nothing to hold onto, or on which pour your anger. Finn didn't know what it was like when the love of your life disappears without a trace of self and after declaring their love. He couldn't know the sense of uncertainty, of instability, of incompleteness that that leaves. It's like a missing and never found person. It's so heartbreaking not to have a grave to cry on, don't be able to find a conclusion. The pain never ends, is a faucet left open, a wound that cannot heal. Because even though it had been many years since they had seen each other the last words Brittany had told her were "I love you." And as in the past fifteen years she had tried to end the relationship, because of those words she just couldn't. She had lived her whole life in uncertainty, she had waited from day to day her return to finish what she had started, she had waited all her life for an explanation. She would have liked Brittany had told her 'goodbye forever' or 'I don't feel anything for you' or 'you've never been more than a friend', she had wanted more than anything else to suffer because it's better to die than to not know if you're alive. Sartre's words floated in her mind while the water wet her hair 'I'll endure anything, your red-hot tongs and molten lead, your racks and prongs and garrotes, all your fiendish gadgets, everything that burns and flays and tears, I'll put up with any torture you impose. Anything, anything would be better than this agony of mind, this creeping pain that gnaws and fumbles and caresses one and never hurts quite enough.'

She remembered that day, it was a Saturday at the end of June, the last day she had seen her. Brittany had knocked on the apartment Santana shared with Rachel and Kurt without notice, she had told her she had left Sam a couple of months earlier.

"Why didn't you tell me before?" She had asked and Brittany had shrugged her shoulders. "Why are you here Britt?" She then had asked and Brittany had shrugged again.

"Do you want to know why I left him?"

"Do you want to tell me?"

Brittany had nodded but had not spoken for a while. She looked at her hands, sitting on the couch, nervously fiddling with the nails of her right hand on the fingers of her left hand. Santana had waited until she had found the courage to shape her thinking.

"I didn't love him."

"No?"

Brittany had shaken her head.

"Why you're here Britt?"

Brittany had raised her head and had looked at her in the eyes. Her eyes were red, like her cheeks, but Santana had not had time to watch her, because Brittany had grabbed her face with both hands and had kissed her. A kiss and then another and then another, light kisses, without the urgency of passion, she had kissed her upper lip and then the lower, she had kissed the outline of her lips, the sides of her mouth, she had moved her hands gripping the back of her head and she had kissed her cheeks, her nose, her forehead, her eyes and Santana had felt her heart slowly speed up, she had felt her lips curl into a smile, she had felt the muscles of her body relax in the thrill of the affection that her best friend's lips gave her. She had called her and Brittany had stopped resting her forehead on Santana's.

"I miss you so much..." Brittany had whispered and Santana had taken her. She had taken her on the couch, she had taken her against the wall and she had taken her in the bedroom and they had laid naked, heated by the hot weather, hugging each other in a tangle of arms and legs and hands and stares and whispers and Santana had smiled and laughed and cried because everything she wanted (have Brittany with her in New York, in her house, in her arms) was there, it was hers.

Brittany had whispered "You're the only person I ever loved San, and you are the only one I'll always love." and she had giggled "I want to spend my whole life with you San." And she had rubbed her face in Santana's neck "I want to live with you, have our own house with a backyard and a swing and a barn with a white horse and a duck and I want some children, but we could start with one and I want a teeter totter too, and a big kitchen where you can make us dinner, and we must choose a neighborhood close to a kindergarten..."

"Hey, hey, slow down Britt-Britt!"

Brittany's face was resting on Santana's chest and Santana didn't see her talking, but she could feel her breath on her skin that tickled and made her giggle.

"You don't want me San?" Brittany had asked.

"Sure I want you and I want a house and I want a home where Kurt and Rachel are not included as furniture and I want an entire hockey team of sons, but not now, in a little maybe, when I'll graduate from college and we'll have both work to maintain us and a house and a family. We certainly can't buy a house with the money my mom gave to me, let alone keep a horse and children! And we're still so young, there'll be time for that. But we could take the duck, right?"

"Sure." it was a whisper, without any sound.

"Rachel would go on a rampage, we should just do it!"

Santana had laughed, but she had not heard Brittany's laughter. She had kissed her head thinking she had fallen asleep and had stopped talking and while the sleep wrapped her, while the senses were leaving her "Santana?" Brittany had called her "Never forget I love you." She had told to her, and Santana had smiled while her heart burnt with happiness.

Santana had dreamed of Brittany that night, because having her just in reality was not enough, she had to have her in unconsciousness too, she wanted to have her all and always. She had dreamed a big house and a garden and a rocking chair and a duck and them watching the sunset.

When she had woken up in the morning Brittany was not in her bed. Santana had stretched with the smile still on her lips and listening to the voices coming from the kitchen. She had got up sure to find Brittany seated enjoying a coffee prepared by Kurt and gossiping about McKinley High. But she wasn't in the kitchen. And the smile had vanished from her lips. She had asked her roommates, but everyone thought Brittany was with her. She had phoned her but a recorded voice said that the mobile number was not active. She had called her at home in Lima, but a friendly voice of a woman had answered saying that the old tenants had left and didn't know where. Santana had wondered and had asked everyone what was happening, she had called every Cheerio and Sue Silvester, she had called all in Glee club, even Sam, but no one had seen her after she had graduated; she had called the neighbors, every relative she remembered the name and she could find the number, but the only certainty she had had was that the Pierce family had left Lima, never to return, but where no one seemed to know. Brittany was gone.

How could she not be angry? Anger was the only thing that allowed her to stay awake and alive. It was the only thing to which she could cling because there was no reason. She still couldn't find an explanation.

Santana sighed and looked up at the jet in the shower. She let the water flowed on her face a little, then closed the faucet and went out. She dressed quickly, putting on the most comfortable clothes she brought and took the phone from her purse. 12:15 pm. Doing a little calculation of the hours, soon all those who Anna had sent the picture to would have started calling her, and she certainly didn't want to talk about that picture or Brittany, so she switched off the phone. She flung herself on the bed. She should get some sleep now that she had her back in a normal bed, but two minutes there and she was already standing. She had to go to Anna. Who knows what Finn had already done? Finn was a fantastic father, but in the absence of Rachel he stopped being so great and became a bit awkward and clumsy and did always something that then she had to fix. She laughed at her strange family and left the hotel taking a taxi to get back to the hospital.


	7. Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7

"She can't eat or drink after midnight on Friday. This is absolutely important, the anesthesia is safest on an empty stomach. On Saturday morning we'll give to her something to drink but you mustn't give her anything, we'll give her and at ten you have to bathe her to reduce the amount of germs on her skin. Ok?"

Santana and Finn both nodded in unison to Dr. Patrice's words.

"After the bath she will be given something to help her relax, a mild tranquilizer, and than she will be taken into the operating room. Ok?"

Again the two nodded. Examinations were all positive and so cardiac surgery staff headed by Dr. Patrice had decided it was time to operate Anna.

"And now the surgery…"

"I don't think I wanna hear that again. They already told us in other hospitals!" Santana stood up and walked to the window looking out. Another cold sunny day.

"Come on Santana he has to tell us!"

"Ok, ok, go on!" she snapped

"So some electrodes will be attached to her chest. These electrodes are connected to an electrocardiogram machine, which will monitor her heart's rhythm and electrical activity. She'll receive a local anesthetic to numb the area where a plastic tube, called a line, will be inserted in an artery in her wrist. An intravenous line will be inserted in a vein and used to give her the anesthesia before and during the operation."

Santana closed her eyes, now came the hard part to play. The explanation operation's procedures was almost like a lullaby. One of those that are sung without feeling when you're so tired because your baby woke up for the umpteenth time that night and the only thing you want is to lose consciousness.

"After she's completely asleep, a tube will be inserted down her windpipe and connected to a machine called a respirator, which will take over her breathing. Another tube will be inserted through her nose and down her throat, into her stomach. This tube will stop liquid and air from collecting in her stomach, so she won't feel sick and bloated when she wake up. A thin tube called a catheter will be inserted into her bladder to collect any urine produced during the operation. An anticoagulant will be given to her to prevent her blood from clotting. Then she'll be hooked up to the heart-lung machine that will keep oxygen-rich blood flowing through her body and so her heart will be stopped and cooled. Next, a cut is made into the heart and the valves replaced. Once the surgeon has finished the replacement, the heart is then started again, and she is disconnected from the heart-lung machine."

"How much time?" Finn asked.

"Three hours on average. Saturday afternoon will be all over!"

All over? Why the hell did that doctor had used the word over? She whirled toward him ready to say something, but then she remembered that he'd operate Anna, she had to stay calm, she had to relax, she needed to trust.

"Ok, that's all, see you in the next few days."

Finn stood up and walked toward the door, but he realized that Santana wasn't following him. "You're not coming?"

"Yeah, I'll join you in a minute."

Finn nodded and left the room. Dr. Patrice looked at the woman who was still at the window turned outwards and not looking at him. But he was watching her, this time with different eyes, she was no longer any one came from America, she was no longer just the mother of a patient, she was the missing piece of an unfinished puzzle placed in a box to collect dust in his mind. "Is there a problem, Ms. Lopez?"

Santana didn't move "I think I have to apologize for this morning and the fight I had with... you know who..."

Roy moaned. "I'm your daughter's doctor and in three days I'll operate her and until that day I don't want to have any kind of relationship with you that is not strictly professional." He paused "But I want to tell you something..." The words caught Santana's attention who turned to him "…you're hurting her, and this is driving me mad. In two days you made her get away from work, you made her fight, you made her cry so many times and this is not from her."

"I know, I'm…"

"No, you don't know, because you don't know her. Maybe you used to know her many time ago but I've known her for twelve years now and I was next to her in these twelve years in all that she had been through and you can't even imagine what beautiful woman she is. I know nothing of your past, I don't care how many and what unresolved issues there are between you two and I don't even want to know them, but I want you to know that you're hurting her and you have to remember it the next time you'll meet her in the hallways hospital. Just that, I don't want to talk to you about Brie or to her about you, at least until Sunday."

Santana walked over to the desk "You're right… you don't know anything. But thank you for keeping all of this as much professional as possible."

"You're welcome."

Roy left the informal talk and smiled to Santana. "So I'm going to visit Anna tomorrow morning, good evening Ms. Lopez!" He reached out to the woman who took his hand and shook it.

"Good evening dottor Patrice!"

Santana left the office and returned to Anna's room. She knew well she was hurting Brittany, she couldn't get out of her head that being hurt was the only thing she deserved. Finn and Anna were sitting at the desk with Finn's mobile was hovering between their four hands and they were arguing over who should hold the receiver. She knew that at the other end was Rachel, she read it in both's eyes.

"Ok stop!" with a leap she reached the desk and grabbed the phone, leaving the two bothered.

"Hi Rach."

"SANTANAAAA!" Rachel shouted and Santana removed the phone from her ear wrinkling her nose. "Oh sweetie how are you? Your phone is over. I tried and tried to call you…"

"Sweetie? You just called me sweetie? I'm not your sweetie Berry! And we are NOT talking about the picture ok?"

"Oh… ok… so… how's Anna? And how's my dear love? How much you two fought so far?"

"Oh well, you don't want to know how am I anymore? What a really bad person you are Rachel!"

"Mami!" Anna scolded her but Santana, betraying her reproachful tone smiled and winked at her daughter. It was just a game, she was just playing with Rachel and Anna understood.

"I'm not a bad person, you just said not want to talk about the picture, so I removed the attention from you, and I direct it to the other members of the family group so that we could change the topic!"

Santana smiled again and then she turned with her back to Anna and Finn. She didn't want her daughter to sense the fear in her eyes as she spoke to Rachel "Ok Rachel, listen. We're going to have surgery on Saturday!"

Rachel was silent for a moment "What? Why you didn't tell me?"

"I thought Finn had called you on purpose!" She turned for a second to Finn "Haven't you call to tell her?"

"Yeah, but someone has stolen my phone!" Finn said ironically, while Anna measured her hand on her father's, trying to figure out if it had grown up since the last time she did it.

Santana looked at her and her throat tightened. She swallowed. "They just said us that. The operation is Saturday at 12 am. "

"Ok, so I'm hanging up because I have to check if there's a plane to fly there, okay?"

"What? No Rach, we agreed you'd come after the surgery, Carole can't keep the kids until Monday and... "

"Aunt Rach is coming!?" Anna yelled jumping on Finn's lap and "When?" Finn said, and the two stood up and started walking around Santana trying to get her attention asking her what Rachel was saying, but Santana didn't know what to answer because the two kept talking and even though she had plugged her free ear with her right hand, she couldn't still hear the woman in America.

"Shut up you two!" Santana shut them loudly and Finn and Anna stopped and fell silent, giggling and glancing to each other. "Rachel what did you say?"

"They're coming, too!"

"Who? The twins?"

"Yes!"

"What? Finn knows? "

At this point, Finn was impatient and upset and he whispered loudly to Santana to give him the phone because he wanted to know what was going on "What do I need to know? Santana, give me that phone!" He tried to grab his mobile, but Santana got rid of him and mouthed "You're fat and flabby!" Finn raised his hands in surrender and sat down on the bed, followed by Anna.

"No Barry, we don't need you here, Finn is in phase 1 of his detoxification from let'ssingaromanticmusicalduetinpreparationofourint imacy and he may have a relapse, and we have to care of Anna, we don't have time to deal with your HPD!"

"What's a HPD Mami?"

"Histrionic personally disorder, honey!"

"Santana please?" Finn tried to stop the woman.

"I will let your insults slipping on me as negative energy Santana, because as you are reluctant to any expression of affection, and as you are reluctant to admit that you're turning down just because you're caring about my children and me, I know that all three of you need me, YOU need me, and we're coming to Italy because a good part of the people we love is there, and I can take it anymore to stay here, waiting and doing nothing! And about my children, I'm not coming alone, we'll change to take care of them."

"Kurt?"

"And Blaine and Quinn!"

"What? All of you are coming? You are crazy! What about your works?"

"We are just bringing forward our Christmas holidays. Just say thanks Santana, please!"

"Thanks Rach!"

"You're welcome, now can I talk to my spouse?"

"Sure. See you soon then!"

And she handed Finn the phone. Finn grabbed it and left the room to get in private more information on what was going on. Anna walked over to her mother.

"Then I'll have the surgery this time?"

Santana picked up Anna to be able to look into her eyes. And nodded.

"In how many days?"

"Saturday."

"Today is Wednesday, right?"

Santana nodded again, suddenly she no longer wanted talking. Her heart was pounding. Anna counted with her tiny chubby fingers and Santana smiled.

"Three days!" Then Anna said, happy to have succeeded in making the sum and Santana hugged her.

"Hey, this afternoon I bought you something, do you want to see it?"

"Yesss! What is it? "

"It's inside my purse, go and see!" She got out Anna who immediately flung herself on her mother's purse opening it and pulling out a book.

"What's Mami?"

Santana went to the desk and called Anna who sat in her mother's lap and placed the book on the wood. The book was wrapped in transparent plastic and on the cover there was a picture of a big doll house.

"Open it!" Santana said and helped the girl to remove the transparent wrapping. Anna opened the book and the pages were made of colored cardboards representing parts of a house. Anna leafed and recognized the bathroom, the kitchen, the bedroom, the living room, the dining room and on the following pages there were objects and furniture and in the last pages there were figures of people and clothes. Leafing through a page, one of the figures, a girl, broke away from the cardboard.

"Mami, I broke it?" she asked worriedly.

"No, honey, all parts must be detached and then assembled to build a dollhouse!" The two started playing excited, and when Finn went back into the room, he helped them, and when the nurses came with the dinner they had just assembled load-bearing walls and dressed a couple of characters who were admiring with humans the work they had done. Anna dined and immediately she wanted to go back to work on the dollhouse, but that night in the multipurpose room would have screened the cartoon Pinocchio and Anna didn't want to miss it, and when the movie ended and the three headed for the north hallway Anna grabbed her parents' hands who were arguing, as always, this time over who was going to stay the night and Anna preferred her mother to remain, but she would never have said that. First she grabbed her mothers' hand, it was comforting and warm. The woman's skin was a little darker than Anna's. Then she grabbed her father's hand and it was safe and strong, and his skin was paler even if not as Doc Brie's, but it was a bit cold. She didn't like cold hands. But she liked the feeling of having her parents together, apart from a holiday some years earlier which she didn't remember much, it had never happened that her parents were together for so long. Although she preferred to stay with them separately, at least she didn't have to always hear them arguing. Sometimes it was really boring. She yawned and Finn picked her up greeting her because he was going to sleep at the hotel. Eventually Mami had won that time too. Anna gave Finn a kiss on the cheek and dived into her mother's arms holding her and whispering "I'm happy you stay!"

Santana laid her on the bed and immediately Anna slipped under the covers. Finn kissed her forehead and went out hailing the women.

"Mami" Anna called her mother when they were alone and Santana laid near her daughter.

"Tell me..."

"Are you afraid?"

The room was dark, Santana had turned off the lights and only the nightlight in the penguin doll close in Anna's arms was on.

"Of what?"

"My surgery..."

Santana froze. Yes, she was afraid, she was fucking terrified, frightened, scared, horrified, petrified, alarmed, anxious, panic-stricken, dismayed, frozen, spooked, startled, and all the synonyms she could find in her mind weren't able to even describe what she felt because it was all this and much much more. It was the ground that was crumbling beneath her feet, it was the sky that was falling on her head.

"No honey."

Anna looked at her puzzled. "Not even a little?"

Santana stroked her hair and kissed her on the nose. Her curious little girl. "Well maybe a little, yes, but I was scared the first time you slept without me to Aunt Quinn too, or during your first somersault in bed and I didn't even want you to walk by yourself when you learned to walk ... so it doesn't count!"

Anna smiled and then yawned. Santana continued to caress her head while the girl's eyes were closing involuntarily overcome by sleep "I'm not afraid Mami…" Anna mumbled and then fell asleep.

Santana instead didn't sleep that night and stayed awake to watch her daughter, to caress her, to kiss her because it was the only thing that soothe her fears, albeit slightly. And she spent the next morning dozing on the sofa while Finn and Anna ended building the dollhouse and she refused to go to the hotel when Finn pointed out that she was too tired and needed to rest. And she look out the door in the afternoon when a familiar laughter reached her ears as the sound of an old spring-driven alarm clock and saw Brittany leaning against the front desk with a hand on a man's shoulder who was laughing with her and observed her ending the laughter holding her belly and adjusting the coat to the man. And she brought her attention for the first time in fifteen years to her white teeth and her pronounced canines that showed timid on the sides of her mouth and a shudder crept under her neck's skin and her heart warmed. And when Brittany turned toward her and saw her and opened her lips in a warm smile Santana looked down and quickly took shelter in the room. And spent the rest of the night with the feeling of that shudder in the neck and being afraid to try it again, while Anna played unaware or unconscious of what would happen to her in a few days and it reassured Santana. And also that night she didn't go to the hotel and she couldn't get to sleep because the day of the operation was too close and she didn't want to leave her daughter. And she heatedly protested on Friday morning when Sara came into the room asking if Anna wanted to take part in a Doc Brie's dance class and she made Anna cry because the girl didn't understand why her mother forbade her to go and Santana let Finn accompany her to OBSERVE the lesson when she could no longer bear to see her daughter sad. And she ordered Finn to stop continuously bringing the blonde in her life because someone had to take the blame. And she listened to Anna that afternoon telling her every detail of the lesson and about the girls with whom she had befriended. And Santana played with Anna to the doll's house, and greeted grandparents Lopez when they came at the hospital directly from the airport and the only thing that Dr. Lopez told Santana was "Ten cuidado, mi hija" (_"Be careful, my daughter!"_) and Santana knew with absolute certainty that he was referring to the pictures he had received two days earlier and they all called grandparents Hudson-Hummel with Santana's phone while from Finn's phone granddads Berry's voices stung the air in the room and there was a lot of confusion there as a farewell party and when everyone started telling Santana that she had to leave the hospital that night because she looked really tired and didn't have to spend another sleepless night because she had to be strong for the following day, Santana blurted out and turn everyone away in a not very kindly way because the last two days had been confused and blurred like a hallucination and she was tired, she was exhausted, she was anxious and scared and confused and wanted to be alone with her girl.

When they were alone, Anna and Santana decided it was time to get ready for the night.

"Mami you wash my teeth?"

Santana's instinct was to satisfy her daughter's request because at that time she would have done anything for her, if she had asked to go out running naked in the hospital parking lot she would have said yes, but she shouldn't behave like if that was the child's last night, she shouldn't even think about it, she couldn't allow her head to formulate a thought remotely similar to that one. It was a surgery, a stupid surgery.

"How about while you brush your teeth I have a quick shower?"

"Ugh! Papi would have washed me!"

"Papi should stop doing things for you that you can do well by yourself!" Santana scold Anna turning on the water of the tiny bathroom's tiny shower. She slipped into the shower while Anna, puffing, squeezed the toothpaste on the toothbrush and started brushing. While Santana was washing herself, she peeked at her daughter from behind the glass. Anna loved to stand looking herself in front of the mirror, she grimaced and spoke with the herself on the other side and sometimes challenged that girl doing sudden movements to see if she was able to do the same. Now she was calling the girl behind the mirror Anne and she was scolding her because she didn't want to brush her teeth.

"Hey Anna, can you tell Anne to wash her hands too?"

"No, not the hands!"

"Come on, without making a fuss!"

"Ok..." Anna said sadly and Santana finished bathing and came out of the shower in her bathrobe.

"Mami? I have to spend the whole day in bed tomorrow?"

Santana sighed "Yes honey, for a few days you'll have to stay in bed."

"But they can come and visit my new friends?"

"Sure, honey, I'm going to call them personally, ok?"

"But Doc Brie can also come?"

Santana sighed again "Sure, whatever you want Anna."

"Yay! I've done, I wait you on the bed, okay?"

"Yes, I'll be right." Santana sat on the toilet bowl as soon as Anna was out and her breathing quickened. Her chest was extremely heavy, as if someone had been sitting on her sternum. She didn't have to think about the surgery. She didn't have to think about the surgery. She needed to focus on little things. Like dressing up, ok, dressing up looked like the smartest thing to do. She took off the bathrobe and put on her underwear and then, what to wear for the night? A tracksuit, perfect, she came from the bathroom and greeted Anna who was sitting on the bed playing with her mother's phone. As if she had not already done damage with that phone. They had all been very understanding about the photo, nobody had pushed her to talk, even Kurt and no one had asked for nothing more than a "Is it true?". But her father's words echoed in her head. "Ten cuidado!". And even if she had told him not to worry, she knew she had to be very careful because Brittany was dangerous, she was harmful, or at least she had been, and his father was referring exactly to that, to all the hours he had heard her sobbing, to the homeopathic cures for insomnia he had prescribed her, to the long talks, to the computers and cell phones and lamps and knickknacks and dishes that she had destroyed in moments of anger. But not only that. His father was referring to the precariousness and fragility of her existence after Brittany was gone, to the concrete walls she had erected around herself that didn't allow anyone to enter, even those who already loved her, and anything to go out, he was referring to long months, if not years, in which there was nothing that fulfill her, nothing that excite her, nothing that satisfy her.

"Ok Santana, the little things, focus!" She said to herself, because wherever her mind went it felt like it was the wrong direction.

"Mami you said something!"

"I told you not to play with my phone or not?"

"Come on Mami, while I'm waiting you!"

The little things. She nodded to her daughter and opened the closet looking for a tracksuit, but she remembered she had left at the hotel the only tracksuit she had brought. She rummaged through her clothes and found a pair of black leggings and a striped green and black long top. Her hair was wet, and even though it was really hot in that hospital, she didn't want to risk catching a cold or worse, something that would take away from her daughter at this moment due to microbes and bacteria. She slipped back into the bathroom and dried her hair until it was almost dry. When she came back in the room Anna had fallen asleep on the blankets and her face had fallen and crushed on the phone. Santana laughed, picking up her daughter and collecting her phone, the girl in her sleep clung to Santana's neck and moaned. Bending the legs and balancing her daughter with one arm, she pulled the covers and laid Anna in the mattress holding her head, as she had learned to do when Anna was a baby and her head was not straight alone. She also went under the covers and stayed a little in that way, hugging the girl, hoping that her daughter's little things made her sleep: her brown hair, her soft and scented skin, her lips so close to hers, her tight back, her hands' delicate fingertips, her feet's round heel. And while she was stroking her she was sure that sleep had taken over, because she was dreaming. She dreamed of a lake with animals drinking in, of an oak with a family of squirrels, of a terrace with a rocking chair, of Anna running around the lake and throwing pieces of bread to the ducks. And dreamed of herself chasing after her daughter, in a run that had been forbidden to her for so long, she dreamed of laughters and dreamed that she grabbed the girl, seized her by the wrist and kept her close to herself and dreamed of her daughter's short breath trying to return to normal and while she was holding her from behind she dreamed of putting a hand on her heart and Santana opened her eyes wide. She had a hand on her daughter's heart and... Santana slipped out of the covers holding her breath moving away from the bed. It did'n beat. Anna's heart was not beating. The room was dark except for the penguin on the bedside table. The darkness hid the truth, things were distorted and frightening, even the hill formed by Anna under the covers was terrifying because it was motionless. Anna's heart was not beating and she was petrified, away from the bed. It was not possible. It was not true. It was a dream, it had to be a dream, she couldn't move her head, she couldn't move her legs, she was standing there looking at her daughter. She could hear her own rapid breathing, the shower leaking in the bathroom, the whispers outside the room, the wind on the glass of the window, but she didn't hear her daughter. It was a nightmare, a scary nightmare because in reality children's hearts didn't cease to beat in their sleep, or yes? And then she saw her. Anna moved and Santana took a step back as if she had just seen a ghost. She collapsed on the couch and didn't move. And not even Anna moved, but she had moved first, Santana was sure or not? Because she was sure that in her daughter's chest there was no heart beat, or yes? Santana's breath came out trembling from her throat. Her head was bursting, her eyelids were heavy and her cheeks tingled. She had to do something, she had to call someone. A nurse, a doctor. Because if anything happened to Anna she would die, she would kill herself with her own hands, she would rip her working heart to give it to her daughter. But her legs didn't respond and her voice didn't come out. The left hand was hurting her and for a moment when her gaze moved over there she saw she was strangling her cell phone and sighed. The phone. She closed her eyes for a moment and sighed again. She must have the strength to call someone, someone who came to check out what was going on, someone to tell her that everything was fine and that those were just the aftermath of a dream. She clenched her jaw and raised her hand. The hand didn't move. She focused again and this time, trembling, it stood up and stopped in front of her face. Even the other hand came up and Santana started scrolling through her contacts trying to remember what to do, who she had to call. She ran the contacts Blaine, Finn, Karen, Kurt, Mami, Pa, Quinn, Rachel, she ran back and forth with her forefinger and was unable to click on any of the names because they were not there, they were either in plane or in America, no one was there, she was alone. Finn couldn't understand because he wasn't a mother and even her mother couldn't understand because she had never deal with what Santana was dealing now, she had been a great mother and didn't know what it meant to be a bad mother as she was. Santana felt ashamed, she didn't want any of them, they would have judged her, blamed her, accused her, they would have said, "You have caused the death of your daughter!" No, she couldn't think about it. No. The little things Santana. And before she realized it her finger had already clicked a contact and now the phone was ringing.

* * *

Brittany had her face buried into the pillow and the covers pulled up over her head. It couldn't be morning yet she was too tired because it could be morning yet, but something was taking her away from unconsciousness. Brittany was one of those people who can sleep in the most unexpected. She had slept on a rail station floor in Rome, in her car's trunk, in Bryan's baby crib, resting in the kitchen table, on her house's stairs. And for Brittany sleeping meant cut the power off and there was nothing that could wake her up for almost the next six hours. Only Bryan, when he was a baby, had been able to keep her alert even in sleep. Brittany had to learn everything of being mom. Many moms told her the same thing, they said that you're never prepared when you have a child, you don't know where to put your hands, how to behave, what to do when you find in hands a being that depends totally on you. But she knew that for those mothers it wasn't as true as it had been for her. Because she knew nothing of children, she didn't know that, when Bryan drunk from her breast, he not only sucked her milk, but her own life. She didn't know that he was so in need of care, and that she was so in need of him. She didn't know that giving life to Bryan had not finished when she had given birth to him, but it continued every day, every time he had cried whenever he had been hungry, or she had changed his diaper, or he'd hurt himself, whenever he had discovered a new thing in the world, or he had asked her how things work or why they stop working, or every time he had wanted to play or laugh or sleep but was too excited or tired to do that, or during his first disappointments or his first arguments that he had not been able to cope, or the first victories, the first true feelings, the first great choices. Brittany had learned slowly many things of being mom and she had been wrong so many times and every time she had been wrong she had seen disappointment and resignation in his son's eyes, and never knew which of the two did more harm. But she had tried to do her best and one of the things she had learned had been that sleeping together with her son, in the same bed, it wasn't hard to wake up when he needed her. She felt him, she felt him through her skin. But now that Bryan was big enough and could take care of himself, every time she fell asleep she turned herself off and only in the morning resumed contact with reality. Tubb loved his owner's unconsciousness, because in this way he could sleep on top of her, in her pillow or under her covers and sneak out before she woke up and forced him to remove hairs from the bed. But at that moment there was something that was waking her up. A noise. Louder and louder. It came into her ears like a jackhammer and Brittany recognized the noise of her phone vibrating in the nightstand. She raised her head sharply and Tubb, crouched between her legs, hopped away quickly. Brittany checked the time. 2:38. Definitly something had happened, who could want her at that time of the night? Bryan. The first thought that went through her mind was that something had happened to her son but the previous evening she had given him good night kiss and she had seen him go upstairs and Bryan wasn't that kind of boy who secretly sneak out of the house. She sat again checking the screen of her phone: it signaled a cell phone number, but it wasn't among her contacts and Brittany was about to hang up and go back to sleep, someone had surely made the wrong number, but then a shudder ran along her back and she shrugged, cleared her throat and answered sleepy.

"Pronto…" (_"Hello…"_) No one answered and at the other end there was silence.

"Pronto chi è?" (_"Hello, who is this?"_) she felt a shaky breath and thought it was a joke but then she felt it: weak, almost insubstantial, a voice.

"I'm…sorry…"

"Santana." She immediately recognized Santana's voice. Even if she was whispering, even if sounds came trembling from her vocal cords, even if in the last fifteen years that voice had become deeper and more mature, she would have recognized it among millions of other voices. "Santana what happened." Another silence.

"I…I shouldn't call…I…" Her voice broke, it was like the crackling of trees blown by the wind in winter, it was sad and painful and it broke her heart.

"Santana please, tell me what happened?"

"Anna…her heart…I don't know…sorry…" and then nothing.

"Santana!"

Only silence answered her.

"Santana!"

But Santana was gone, she had hung up. Brittany, confused, tried to call back that number, but the phone was no longer operative, Santana surely turned it off. She threw herself off the bed and started to dress. Meanwhile, she called the hospital but no one answered. She put her jeans, hoodie, boots and descended into the kitchen. She scribbled a message for Bryan on a piece of paper. "If you wake up and I'm not home it's because I had to leave early this morning. I can't prepare you breakfast, I'm really sorry. I send a message to Luciana to tell her you go with them to school. Buongiorno amore mio!"

She didn't know if she had written something that made any sense, but she had to go to the hospital, in a hurry, she had to see what had happened, she didn't have to waste time, she couldn't even waste time thinking about what had just happened. Santana Lopez had just called her. Why? If something had happened to that little girl...no. She went out the house and the icy cold of the night catched her off guard. The air smelled of ice, it might have snowed, but not that night, that night the sky was free of clouds and thousands of stars lit up the black upper air. She got into the car and rushed quickly into the street. Then called the hospital again and this time someone answered.

"Anna Hudson-Lopez sta bene?" (_"Anna Hudson-Lopez's okay?"_)

"Scusi chi è lei?" (_"Excuse me, who are you?"_) The night shift nurse answered with an annoyed and overbearing voice.

"Sono Brittany Pierce, Doc Brie. Mi può per favore dire se la paziente sta bene?" (_"I'm Brittany Pierce, Doc Brie. Please can you tell me if the patient is okay?"_)

"Certo che sta bene, le abbiamo controllato la temperatura un'ora fa e stava dormendo con sua madre." (_"Of course she's okay, I have checked the temperature an hour ago and she was sleeping with her mother."_)

"Ok, può controllare di nuovo?" (_"Ok, can you check it again, please?"_)

"Bè…se ci fosse qualcosa che non va non crede che lo sapremmo? Siamo qui a controllare i pazienti, non a girarci i pollici!" (_"Well... if there was something wrong don't you think we would know? We are here to check patients, not to twiddle our thumbs"_) The nurse grumbled not at all subtly showing all her irritation while Brittany drove and expected some kind of answer from the woman who was talking to without respond to the provocation. "Adesso vado a vedere." (_"I'm going to check."_) Finally the nurse said, and Brittany heard her place the phone on the front desk and heard her clogs on the linoleum of the north hallway. Then a bell rang in another hallway and Brittany heard the same cogs quickly change direction and head toward the sound of the bell. She waited a bit, but could only hear the muffled voices coming from the other hallway and at some point another nurse approached the counter and grudgingly too "Ma chi ha lasciato la cornetta alzata?" (_"But who left the handset picked up?"_) He hung up. Click. Perfect. Brittany was tempted to call back, but it seemed that nurses on the night shift didn't have time to waste on the phone. Or maybe they were just tired. She pressed on the accelerator. When there was traffic it took fifty minutes to get to the hospital but that night Brittany broke a number of road rules like speed limit a few times (or maybe more) and red lights, but managed to get to the hospital in 35 minutes. She kept repeating at herself that surely nothing had happened while she parked near the entrance in one of the parking lot reserved for doctors breaking another rule. But if nothing had happened why Santana had called? She threw herself headlong chasing the night without thinking, as happened sometimes, well very often it was not her head that commanded her actions but were so many other things: her stomach, her desires, her hands, her heart, her compassion. And maybe that night all of this had driven her because if she would had used the head, and the head only, she would remembered what Santana had said a few days before and maybe she would never dropped from her bed. But she got out of the car in less than 30 seconds and ran towards the entrance and ran to the elevators and ran toward the north hallway and in Anna's room.

The room was dark. There was a faint light on the bedside table on the right side of the bed that came from the belly of a doll. Santana was in front of her. Even in the darkness Brittany saw her well. She was sitting on the sofa bed, at her feet lay the phone. She could see her eyes blacker then black fixed in the vacuum and she didn't move. She looked terrified. Brittany stepped into the room but Santana still didn't move. There was cold in those eyes, a chilling cold that she had never seen before. She walked over to the woman, but Santana still had no reaction. Brittany started to seriously worry and when she was in front of her and saw her eyes still lost in the void she knelt brushing her knees. Brittany was positioned at the height of Santana's face, in front of her eyes, but Santana's gaze looked through her, she was looking Brittany but without really seeing her.

"Hey…" Brittany said.

"I killed her." Santana said and Brittany froze.

"What do you mean?"

"I killed her…" it seemed that those were the only three words that Santana could say. And she repeated them, like a rosary. Brittany stood up and turned to Anna, who was curled up under the covers. Her heart was pounding, hundreds of beats were running and stumbling over each other. And if it were true? After all she didn't know that Santana, what did she know about her? Nothing. She could have become even a serial killer for all she knew. She used to be mean sometimes back in High School, and she had had lots of fight. But kill her own child? For a moment she regretted to be run to the hospital. Santana was right, she had nothing to do with them, anymore, but that night, few minutes earlier, Santana had called her, and for some strange reason she couldn't help but run for her. She walked over to the bed slowly. She had to see, understand why Santana kept incessantly to repeat those three words in her trance that now, as vomit, they came painfully out from her throat. When she was next to Anna she held her breath and pulled her lower lip in her mouth starting biting furiously. What would she find there? She stretched out a trembling hand to the covers. She had to remove them, yet it was so difficult to reach the blanket, as if the wind of a hurricane was blowing between her and the girl. She touched them. She grabbed them with two fingers and held them up. The girl didn't protest. She didn't move. What should she do? She had to try to wake her, feel her heartbeat, but she couldn't touch her. If she was cold? If death had really taken her away? She brought two fingers to the girl's nose and positioned them below the nostrils. She waited. "You must be alive!" She whispered imperceptibly and realized she had spoken to herself and not to the child. The air hit her fingers and then stopped and then hit her fingers again and then stopped. Anna was breathing. Brittany looked up at the ceiling and exhaled. "Thanks!" again came the whisper from her lips. She stroked the girl's cheek. It was warm and was moving. Under that hand there was a little girl who was breathing and shivering from the sudden temperature change and maybe dreaming because her eyes were moving quickly.

"I killed her? Tell me!"

Santana said out loud and Anna stretched. Brittany turned around, took a couple of steps to be again next to Santana and knelt again. Santana looked at her with those black and lost eyes.

"No Santana."

"She's dead, I killed her, right? Her heart doesn't beat anymore, isn't it? "

"No Santana, no." Brittany stroked her knees, speaking softly "Your daughter is fine, she's sleeping."

"It's not true. I don't deserve her." Santana hid her face in her hands.

"Santana stop, but what are you talking about?".

Brittany grabbed her wrist and pulled her.

"Come with me ..."

"No!" Brittany grabbed her other arm and forced Santana to get up, "No!" and when she was standing she forced her to take a step, "No!" and then another "No!" and then to the bed, "No please no!" Santana begged Brittany squeezing her eyes. "Don't let me see what I've done."

But Brittany shifted to the left leaving room for Santana to see Anna.

"Look!" And Santana watched. The little girl was sleeping on her back and her face was turned to the ceiling. Brittany had lowered the covers to the child's waist so that her face and her torso were uncovered. Brittany, who was still clutching her wrist, pulled slightly Santana's arm and put her free hand on Santana's lowerback pushing her and making her get even closer to her daughter.

Brittany brought Santana's arm hovering over Anna's chest. The woman's hand was clenched into a fist and her every muscle shook. Brittany slid her hand toward the back of Santana's hand and put her fingers in Santana's narrow ones, forcing her to open her hand. Then she shifted her gaze on Santana's profile. Her face was a mask of fear and her eyes, fixed on her daughter, didn't really look at the child, but, as previously, they were lost in that kind of semi-consciousness. They were very similar to a child Bryan's eyes when he sleepwalked around the house. Brittany placed the woman's palm on her daughter's chest and pressed it against the tiny rib cage and left her hand to protect Santana's.

"Do you feel her heart? It's there where it was today, and where it'll be tomorrow."

Santana felt it this time, faint irregular heartbeats as she was used to feel, Anna's lungs filled up and emptied rhythmically and Santana's hand was caught between the warmth of her daughter's chest and that of Brittany's palm. And both were real. She closed her eyes and started shivering, she shuddered convulsively and Brittany was so close to her, on her left, she could feel that even without touching her and then Santana closed her eyes and threw her head to the side and put it on the blonde's chest and started to let into her lungs as much air as possible, because she wasn't supposed to cry and had to calm her heart. She slid her hand away from that heat and wrapped her arms around herself and turned around, and turned around her head so that now her forehead was on Brittany's chest and the air she breathe now tasted of white musk and jasmine and skin. Brittany had no idea what to do and where to put her hands and while the right one remained inert along her side, the left one left the girl's chest and moved upwards and touched Santana's cheek, her ear, slightly as a breath, and then slowly found her hair and slipped inside finding the thread of sweat slid into Santana's scalp. And Brittany closed her eyes while a vertigo turned the room around her and forced her heart to cough frantically in her chest and she knew perfectly well that Santana could feel it. Santana felt her.

Ten cuidado. Ten cuidado. Santana repeated herself because that hand, that smell, were poisoning her again, but the poison was more like a drug, she knew that it was hurting her, but she couldn't help it. Fifteen years of her life was gone in a second and now she was on her bed in that night of June to dream of spending the rest of her life with that woman.

Santana walked away abruptly from Brittany. "I'm sorry ... I ... I'm sorry if I called you, sorry. It's better you leave now." She said without looking at the blonde, without even raising her eyes an inch from the ground.

Brittany, instead, looked at her and Santana seemed to her so small, tiny and she would have liked to pick her up and hold her and rock her to relieve her pain.

"Are you okay now?" Brittany asked and Santana shook her head. She wanted to tell her that that was none of her business, that she would have done better to go away instead of staying standing there looking at her and feel pity for her, but she just shook her head.

"Can I stay a little here with you?"

Santana suddenly raised her head and looked at Brittany's eyes.

"You…you shouldn't…I…mean I… can't ask you that!"

"Ok, I'm gonna stay if you don't start to hit me!" And she smiled. "Can I stay?"

Ten Cuidado Santana Lopez. No, no, no, no puede quedarse. ¡Aléjate de ella! ¿Qué coño quiere? Ella no tiene mas el poder de jugar con usted. De vencerte. Atiéndela. Ahora o nunca. Si dejas que ella entre ahora, no podrás sacarla nunca mas. (_Be careful Santana Lopez. No, no, no she can't stay. Get away from her. What the fuck does she want? She no longer has the power to play with you. To conquer you. Send her away. Now or never. If you let her in now you wont be able to get her out again._) Santana closed her eyes hushing her thoughts and nodded. Brittany walked over to the bed and pulled Anna's covers up and then grabbed again Santana's wrist, dragged her toward the sofa bed and forced her to sit beside her then let her go. They sat for a few moments. In silence. Brittany waited. She didn't know what, she didn't know if she should ask her something, she didn't know if she should speak and with what right she could want to know what was going to Santana at that moment. But then Santana had called her, Brittany had to find the strength to talk to her, she breathed but didn't speak, she breathed again but Santana spoke.

"She ... I'm such a bad mother. I don't deserve her. She's so sweet and sunny and I've ruined her life." Santana rested her elbows on her knees and buried her face in her hands.

"Why do you say that?" Their voices were whispers.

"I haven't taken care of her. I haven't taken care of her well and now ... it's all my fault ..."

"What do you mean?"

Santana didn't answer immediately, but pulled her hands away from her face and leaned back against the backrest. Brittany wouldn't have judged her, she was sure of that. No one had ever judged or blamed her for Anna's illness, not with words, but she had read the blame in her relatives faces many times, or so it seamed to her. It wouldn't happen with Brittany. She just knew. "She had a stupid sore throat. The doctor told me to let her stay home for a few days and give her a syrup and dad prescribed her some homeopathic tablets and so I did but the sore throat didn't go away, so I brought her back to the doctor and the sore throat was a pharyngotonsillitis and the doctor told me I could choose whether or not to give her antibiotics since the disease was receding now alone and I chose not to. I didn't know, he didn't tell me what could happen."

Santana ran her fingers through her hair and Brittany waited, without saying a word.

"I chose not to give her antibiotics. I've never taken an antibiotic in my entire life... but three weeks later the fever came and then joint pain and palpitations and tiredness and chest pain and they told me it was rheumatic fever and I had to take her to the hospital immediately and she had to subject to a penicillin therapy to destroy bacteria, aspirin for joint pain, steroids and other medicines I can't remember the name for the heart. They told me that there was a 70% chance that Anna would develop heart problems after the disease would be cured, but they also told me they probably would have occurred in adulthood and one year later, her heart began to have problems and they told me that her mitral valve had to be replaced."

Santana looked at Brittany "All because I was so stupid not to give her a fucking antibiotic!"

Santana stood up and started to pace into the room breathing deeply. Now her voice was no longer a whisper, but it was low enough not to wake Anna, as if Santana knew how to measure out the sound in order to keep sleeping her child. "I'm tired, I don't take it anymore, I don't want watch her suffer anymore, or forbid her to do something that all children should do as running or jumping or doing a somersault on the bed or..." she stopped, turned to Brittany and pointed her with the hand "...dance... I don't take it any more to see her get in and out of hospitals, medicines, analyzes, those damn blood tests that every time I see a needle slip into her skin I'd like to kick all of them, it's so scary to see all that blood leave my baby's body."

Brittany had an idea of why Anna was so frightened by blood tests. But still she said nothing. She looked at her and Santana was just in front of her and even though the darkness of the room hid her features and the expression of her face, Brittany knew that now she was looking at her because her eyes gleamed in her direction, full of life.

"Can you just calm me down like you did with Anna?" Santana hadn't said it. Or maybe yes. But she wouldn't have said it, she didn't need that woman to calm down, she might do it herself, she had to do it herself, as she had always done. But instead her voice had spoken, and had come out trembling and needy. Brittany broke up and let the tears wetting her eyes, but didn't let them fall and let instead a smile appeared on her lips.

"Can you just…" Santana resumed but her voice broke and Brittany reached out toward her. "Come here." She invited her to sit beside her on the sofa bed. Santana grabbed Brittany's hand and let herself pull and let herself sit. Then Brittany got up. Santana watched as she took off her jacket and approached the desk chair and picked it up and carried it in front of the sofa bed. She looked at Brittany as she took a blanket from the closet and watched her as she sat back on the sofa, at the right end and leaned her legs on the chair slipping on her butt and lying a bit. Then "Lay down." Brittany said to Santana who obeyed without hesitation as if it were a medical therapy or as if she were undergoing a spell. Santana rested her head on Brittany's lap and stretched her legs on the sofa, then she turned around turning her face to the blonde's and looked at her again. Brittany unfolded the blanket and laid it on Santana's legs. Santana closed her eyes. Brittany was soft and warm, she felt it with her cheek pressed upon her. She opened her eyes and looked at her. The bedside light lit up the right side of Brittany's face. Her hair was rotated behind her ear falling on her shoulder and coming to rest in her chest. Her mouth was slightly ajar, and curled into a smile. She had a red cheek and that eyes that didn't move from hers seemed dark, too dark because the lack of light had dilated her pupils in an exaggerated way.

" You're not even a doctor, right Santana?" Brittany asked.

Santana nodded.

"I know how difficult it can be to see a child suffer, you know I work here and believe me, I can imagine that seeing your child in pain is heartbreaking, it's the most painful thing a human being can experience. But it's not your fault. And I know that you won't stop beating yourself just hearing my words and I know that this guilt will remain inside you all your life, but sometimes we make choices that we believe they're right, when we make them, and only after we realize that they're not, but by now, we have made them and if there's no way to go back, we can decide how to go on, though. Santana, how long you don't sleep or eat properly?"

Santana shook her head. She didn't know. She didn't remember. She didn't care.

"You can't go on that way. You have to find another way."

Brittany hesitantly reached out her right hand towards Santana's head and with a finger stroked her hair sprawled in her thighs. Santana felt the pressure of the finger and held her breath for a second, because Brittany was touching her hair and it didn't hurt.

"You need to rest, you have to sleep because tomorrow will be a long day and you must be strong and..."

"I can't make it! How do I? I can't let her alone in the operating room. I can't. I can't wait for three or more than three hours knowing they're going to open her chest and I wont be there with her..." Brittany's hand moved on Santana's forehead and shifted a lock of hair that was resting on her cheek. Santana felt the touch of her fingers in her skin and held her breath for a second, because Brittany was touching her cheek and even that didn't hurt.

"You have to trust us. There's no other place in the world where I would bring my...a son to undergo surgery. I trust Roy, Dr. Patrice, like no other in the world. I'll entrust him the lives of people I love the most in this world."

"He is a man too! He can do something wrong! "

"Listen Santana you want to make a deal with me?"

A laugh came from the brunette's lips who hid her face on Brittany's hoodie and her smell came up right to her mind. Brittany searched with her left hand Santana's hand that was resting on her side. She put the tip of her middle finger on her hand and started to brush the back, lightly, without invading too much, Santana welcomed her as an unexpected guest, surprised and pleased. Every now and then the other fingers' tips fell on her skin and Santana felt light chills run down her arm. She held her breath for more then a second, because Brittany was touching her hand and this also didn't hurt.

"Okay, let's make that deal!" Santana said.

Brittany smiled "Okay, now you promise me that you'll try to close your eyes and relax..." Santana could do it well because the combined action of Brittany's hands on her skin and her hair was already hypnotizing her and it wouldn't be long before losing consciousness.

"And what about you? I think that inviting my daughter to your house you've invited me too, right?"

Brittany chuckled "And tomorrow I'll go back and forth between you and the operating room, every hour, to keep you informed of how the surgery is going. What do you say?"

Santana pulled her head from Brittany's lap and raised slightly incredulous "You can do that!?"

"I'm not a doctor, but, you know, I have my connections here. Of course I can do it. And if I can't I'll find a way to do that!" And chuckled again pushing back Santana's head on her lap.

"I don't know what to say..."

"Deal done, then?"

"How about every half an hour?"

Brittany smiled, "Ok, I'll do my best. Deal done?"

"Yes, absolutely!"

"Okay, then close your eyes now."

Santana closed her eyes and Brittany's hands again started to do their magic on her skin. And then another spell: Brittany began to sing. It was a whisper in a foreign language but it was a lullaby, "Ninna nanna al mio ciocione e di pane non ce n'è un boccone…" Santana recognized the cadenced rhythmicity and the repetition of musical motifs, she wanted to open her eyes, to see the woman's lips part to let out the sounds, but she was too afraid to break that spell "Né del crudo e né del cotto, né del macinato troppo…" it was a lullaby that tasted of ancient times, of old yellowed photos, of women with long skirts and children in swaddling bands "Il mugnaio non è venuto lo potesse mangiare il lupo…" it was a lullaby that came from another time and another world and came out of Brittany's mouth as if it had always been there "E il lupo e la lupaia, gli venisse l'anguinaia…" Santana didn't want to fall asleep, she still wanted to hear the chant but now unconsciousness had got the better.

Brittany felt Santana's muscles relax, her head first, then her legs, then the breathing became deeper and finally, with a last spasm Santana grabbed Brittany's hand that was caressing her and fell asleep. Brittany kept singing "L'anguinaia l'è mala cosa e più su ci sta una sposa…" Anna rolled over in bed opening her eyes towards Brittany and when she saw the woman, she lifted her torso holding dangerously balanced on her elbows. Brittany smiled at her, realizing that she was awake but she was not conscious, like children can be. She raised her voice so that the little girl could hear her lullaby too "E più giù ce ne sta un'altra, una la fila e una l'annaspa…" Anna dropped down the pillow still looking at Brittany "Una fa il cappelino di paglia pe' portarlo alla battaglia…" Anna closed her eyes and smiled "La battaglia e il battaglino dettero foco a Barberino…" Brittany ended the lullaby even if her only listeners in the room were now asleep. "Barberino corri corri dette foco a quelle torri…" Bryan loved this lullaby, Brittany had learned it when she started attending the acting company which was now part. "Una torre la si spezzò…" because in the company there were musicians playing folk songs and among them they played this lullaby and Brittany had learned it and there was a time when she sang it always with Bryan and they had also made a rap version of it. "E i' bambino s'addormentò, e i' bambino s'addormentò." In their rap version after falling asleep, the baby always woke up.

Brittany then was silent listening to Anna's and Santana's breathing. The little girl's was faster and heavier and sometimes even gave a hint of a snore. She looked at Santana. She had a tense frown on her face. Brittany wanted to kiss away all the woman's stress and tension, she remembered the times when she had done it, the times when her lips had touched the taut muscles of Santana's face softening them and causing them to rest. But she wasn't bold enough to do so. In the end she had chosen to leave her fifteen years earlier, to vanish from her life and she knew that the guilt for a wrong choice doesn't disappear with a kiss. She let her right hand rise from the woman's hair and the back of her index started to caress the curve that is when the nose meets the forehead. Santana's features became immediately more relaxed and Brittany smiled and tilted her head to the side because the feeling of having Santana in her arms was one of the most pleasant and satisfying she had ever felt. Brittany looked at Anna and saw that she was still smiling in her sleep and a jolt shook her heart, that little girl had already entered beneath her skin. She looked at Santana, and removed her index finger from her forehead and dunked her hand in her dark hair, massaging warily and softly her head. Santana. Santana in her lap. Santana between her fingers. Santana in her eyes. Santana in her nose. If her son taught her, she wanted to pray now because there was nothing in the world more pure and divine of Santana in her life.

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**A/N** I don't know when exactly I'll be able to update the story, maybe a few weeks will pass. Well I have to write first and then translate (and this is a real difficult job, trying not to do too many mistakes and to write something understandable!) And then I have to recover from all the emotional implications that writing brings with ... and I also have to work, a lot... ;D

I hope you like this chapter, as the story, and ... better times will come, I promise. Thanks for the reviews. They are really really really important for me and they support me. So if you want, if you like, if it don't take you too much time, write!

I omitted the translation of the lullaby because it's made of words in the Tuscan dialect, but it's a lullaby that speaks about a war that occurred in 1114 in Siena's hills and it supposedly comes from that time. It talk about lack of food and bread and three brides who work to make a straw hat for someone who has to go into battle and finally speaks of towers falling and a child who falls asleep at the end.

Thank you again.

To listen to the lullaby search on youtube: Caterina Bueno "Ninna nanna di Barberino"


	8. Chapter 81

A/N Sorry for the delay. Over the past two months I had to work hard and it was a very difficult chapter to write and translate, many characters involved. I publish today the first part, I still have to translate the second one, but it should not take too long. And Chapter 9 is already in the works! :)

Thanks to everyone who read and, if you want, review it (I love when you do it)!

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Chapter 8

Part one

Anna wrinkled her nose as soon as the laughter of a man right outside the door of her room reached her ears. She was not really asleep when she heard the man pass in front of her door and squeak like a mouse amused by something that surely she would not understand. Sometimes adults laughed at strange things and remained serious in front of really fun things, like the mustache of some men, mustache was a really fun thing. Once a doctor had visited her, his name was Fish, Dr. Fish and he had a bushy, reddish and uncombed mustache that sagged in his upper lip and covered almost entirely his nostrils and every time he breathed the air passed through the mustache with a noise that seemed almost a whistle. Anna chuckled at the thought of that man, no, she was not asleep, she was dozing. She loved so much waking up and lying in bed and staying warm under the blankets, even better if there was Mami against who she could curl up, but where was Mami? She opened her eyes, wide awake this time, and reached behind her back, but there was just her in bed. She rolled over and as soon as she was completely turned to the sofa bed: she couldn't believe it! Doc Brie was there. She saw Doc Brie on the sofa bed and the woman was sleeping sitting with her head resting on the back and in her lap there was her Mami's head who was sleeping too, lying on the couch, and Doc Brie had a hand hidden in Mami's hair and the other sandwiched between Mami's hands. She wrinkled her nose again, sitting down on the bed. Why Mami was hugging Doc Brie and not her? Why Doc Brie was stealing her morning dose of cuddles? She frowned and folded her arms across her chest, trying to find a way to detach the two and to take her mom all to herself. Maybe she should wake them as she usually did with the twins! She stopped, watching the two women. Doc Brie had a really pretty face. The sun lit her up fully, showing the freckles on her nose and cheeks. And Anna touched the unicorn that was hanging from her neck and laughed because even freckles were a funny thing, and also very cute, and sweet, they seemed many little stars, and the dancer's face was the sky. Instead she didn't see her mom's face that was turned to Doc Brie. Even the clasped hands of Mami and Brie made her laugh, but that time not because they were funny, but because seeing those two so close to each other, and touching too, it gave her a strange feeling of calm. They had argued for days, that two, maybe they had made peace now. Anna liked Brie so much. She was funny and when she laughed her whole face lit up and the things she said always had a sense for Anna and every time Anna spoke, Brie really listened to her and didn't make her feel little or stupid. And then when Brie danced she was like a jellyfish. Anna had seen jellyfishes. Mami, Aunt Quinn and Aunt Rach some day had brought her to New York Aquarium, twins were not there, they were with the Berrys, camping and fishing at Indian Lake State Park. That day she had met Beth, she remembered that day last spring, Aunt Quinn was so excited because Beth was also there, here's another blonde to add to the list of her acquaintances. Beth had the same smile of Aunt Quinn that day and the girl had shaken her little hand like adults do and she had strongly shock it making her laugh. Beth was a really beautiful and kind girl and Santana had explained to Anna that she was Quinn's daughter but also Shelby's daughter who was Aunt Rach's mother and when Anna had asked if Quinn and Shelby were married Quinn and Beth had made both a disgusted face laughing to Anna's words repeating "No, no! Never!" and then Santana had explained that neither of the two was a lesbian and Anna had tried to understand why then they were both Beth's moms and Aunt Rach had laughed, had lowered, had picked her up and had hold Anna to her telling her "My little inquisitive chestnut!" and then she had sent Santana to buy tickets to enter the aquarium. Her mother had tried to complain, saying in a not very nice way that she was not the Bank of America and that everyone would have to pay for themselves but eventually she had done as Aunt Rach had asked her and meanwhile Aunt Quinn had explained that she was the biological mother, that she had given birth to the girl and Shelby was the adoptive mother, she had grown the girl up. And when Anna had asked if Rachel and Beth were sisters, all of them had laughed without giving an answer. With adults often happened that, when Anna asked so simple questions, they laughed and changed the subject without answering, but in the face of complicated issues, such as what to wear in the morning or how to turn an egg into an omelet, they always gave so detailed explanations as to be boring. Adults were really strange. And Anna's family was full of strange adults and full of uncles who were not really her uncles and full of grandparents and full of gays and full of artists. Eventually they had come into the aquarium and while Beth and Quinn had fallen in love with sea lions, and Rachel and Santana had spent a good quarter of an hour with their noses stuck in the same window Santana observing sharks eagerly and with tears in her eyes and Rachel emitting childish sounds of appreciation for sea turtles, Anna had been fascinated by jellyfishes. They had entered into a dark and frightening room, but on the walls there were enormous blue windows that looked like television's screens and through those glasses many species of jellyfish floated in the water moving simultaneously every part of their transparent body, dragging their tentacles in their rocking motion; they were enchanting, hypnotic. And when Brittany danced she was exactly a transparent jellyfish and those blond hair were her tentacles.

Anna got out of bed and walked quietly to the women. Her sweaty feet left tiny footprints on the warm linoleum floor. She walked over to the sofa bed touching Doc Brie's knees who however didn't move and then Anna leaned forward, she stretched her head over Santana's chest to see her face. Her Mami was beautiful. She was the most beautiful mother of all mothers in the whole world. She was super ultra beautiful... and she was hers. She chuckled clasping her hands over her mouth to not let out the sound, she didn't want to wake her mom, she seemed so serene, her features were soft and relaxed and Anna had never seen her like this, or at least she didn't remember. Every time they slept together, she had a frowned and pensive look, even when she was not conscious. Whether it was Brie who made her sleep so peacefully?

Maybe it was a girlfriends thing. Maybe even Karen made her sleep so well. Anna didn't know it, she couldn't get in her mother's room when Karen stayed over for the night. Not that it happened this often, but sometimes it happened, and when it happened Anna had to stay in her bedroom until Mami came to wake her up for breakfast. She also had to go to bed early with no cuddling and when Karen stayed for dinner Anna had to eat more composed than usual and don't interrupt while the two adults were talking and that was why she was always so quiet, ate her meal quickly and then went straight to her room. She didn't like Karen at all and Anna was super convinced that it was mutual, Karen didn't like Anna, Anna believed that Karen hated all children because she had no idea how to deal with a child and not even she tried to. She wasn't nice, she never make her laugh, she didn't know what to talk about with her, probably she thought Anna was stupid because if they were left alone in a room Karen never talk to her and started to look into an indefinite point in the room nodding her head. If she brought her a gift, it was never wrapped in and it was always something Anna didn't like: once she had given her even a toothbrush, yes it was pink and the handle had the shape of a Barbie princess and there was a light on the handle to let know how long to brush for. But it was still a toothbrush. You cannot give a toothbrush to a five-year-old girl! Brittany had given her an unicorn! Karen was one of those adults who didn't give anything, no feeling, no particular sensation, if they looked at you there was nothing in their eyes but a questioning and scared look like someone who has just seen an alien.

And she wasn't beautiful at all. She had brown and really short hair and a big bulbous nose, she was short, perhaps shorter than Aunt Rach and she always wore too baggy pants and too tight shirts and she had the bad habit of scratching her nose with her thumb nail, and that made Anna really, really nervous. Her mother had told her that Karen was a soldier, in the army, and she liked her even less because Anna didn't like either guns or weapons or wars.

Brittany sighed and untangle her hand from Santana's hair, moving it behind her neck and massaging without opening her eyes. Anna slipped back onto the bed, under the covers giggling because she wanted the two women to believe that she was still asleep.

When Brittany opened her eyes after having rubbed them furiously, trying to send away the sleep that still was wrapped around her head, Anna was curled up on the bed with her eyes closed and a smile on her face. Brittany looked at her and smiled too, she knew the little girl was awake, she had heard her sneaking around the sofa bed in her sleep.

Her left shoulder ached, and when she tried to lift her arm she felt that something was holding her. Someone. She shifted her gaze on her left hand and it was docked in a strange mix of skin and fingers to Santana's hand. She had squeezed those hands so many times in the past, and that entanglement of pink and caramel skin was so familiar and yet so far. She moved her thumb on the inside of Santana's wrist caressing her and a chill went up to her neck. Santana's skin was soft and the tendons were rigid due to the position of her forearm. Santana squeezed Brittany's hand and Brittany froze. She shifted her gaze to Santana, to her face, to see if she had woken her up. Her heart went fast in her chest and she had to sigh more than once to try to slow it down a bit. Santana was still asleep. Years had made her much more beautiful than she remembered. Her face was slightly more rounded and more mature. The passage of time had left yet no particular mark on her skin. Her eyes fell on Santana's forehead on her hairline and flowed down to her ear. Her hair, which in the rest of the head was slightly wavy, there, near her ear, was curled and rebels. Her free hand moved almost involuntarily to shift a lock that covered her face and hid her ear. Oh God how much she wanted to see again all the hidden parts of her body but her hand stayed just inches away, without touching, Brittany smiled to herself, was it possible that only watch that woman were to increase her breath? Was it possible that it could be possible? How long she had waited to see her again… How much she had dreamed those lips, those black eyes, those small ears… Santana's breathing was calm and light, the sleep was slowly leaving her and Brittany wished she didn't wake up, she wanted her that way helpless, silent, inert, like a doll, abandoned in her lap, in her arms, lulled by the rise and fall of her breathing. She wanted to play with her, stroke her, touch her, without any consequence, without words, without past or future. Especially without a past. Because if Brittany had not made all those mistakes, if Santana had not said those words, if there were no fifteen years of anger and whys between them, then maybe... But Santana was waking up and suddenly Brittany no longer felt so bold as she had been the previous night. There was no darkness to hide things, to make them magical and quiet. There was the light of the sun, which lit up Santana and Brittany seemed that touch her again, in the reality revealed by the light, it would be like desecrating a temple. Nostalgia. Guilt. Resignation. Admiration. It was everything she was feeling, all together and she wondered how, in a time of a few seconds, all of these feelings could live in her head and in her heart.

"Hey ..." Brittany whispered to distract herself. Santana stretched her legs and brought her right hand, the one that was still intertwined in Brittany's, close to her lips. She was not awake, not yet, not entirely, Brittany felt the other woman's breath tickling her knuckles and her heart resumed to beat wildly in her chest then stopped abruptly. Santana extended her lips to Brittany's fingers. Brittany felt them, like silk, slide in the back of her hand, looking for a forgotten pleasure and Brittany exploded, everything inside her collapsed, her stomach clenched, her heart trembled, her veins spat boiling blood on her face and on her lower belly, her mouth opened, letting go a noisy breathing and her eyes grew moist. And when Santana stiffened and blocked her every move, Brittany realized she had woken up.

Santana was suddenly aware of what she was doing when she opened her eyes and recognized the hand she was gripping and recognized the skin she was stroking. Abruptly she pushed away her lips from that hand and looked up at Brittany's face. Brittany greeted her with a smile, a sweet, sad smile. And beautiful.

"Good morning ..." The blonde said to her without giving her time to collect her thoughts on what happened the night before and what was happening at that time. She was subtle the blonde, maybe she thought that, distracting her, she could keep with that pantomime, that comedy in which the two of them were the protagonists and performed to meet after a long time and love each other again like nothing had happened. No, Santana didn't want to play that part, Santana was stronger than all of that, stronger than her, she would have resisted those hands, that disarming smile, those piercing blue eyes and her own heart that was broking her rib cage.

"Good morning to you too Anna ..." Brittany greeted the girl who still had her eyes closed.

Santana stood up sitting on the sofa bed leaving immediately Brittany's hand and moved to the opposite side slamming her back on the arm creating more space as possible between her and the blonde, running away. Anna. Saturday. The surgery. The heart. Anna. She needed space, she needed air, but above all she needed space between herself and Brittany because she couldn't let her be close to her again, no more than she had done the past night. She was hurting herself with her own hands, no, she had already hurt herself with her own hands. She had approached the fire, she had not burned, not yet, but she had felt that heat on her skin, her lips, her veins and it was too painful. She had to get away. She had to stay focused on what was really important that day. Anna. Anna. And only Anna.

"How did you know I was awake?" Anna complained and got off the bed walking towards her mom and climbing on her lap. "Good morning Mami!" Anna greeted her and Santana hugged her and embraced her and incorporated her inside her arms closing her eyes still with the memory of the previous night dream that scraped her throat and the feeling of loss in her heart. Santana picked up Anna's face in her hands and forced her to turn it into her eyes and stared at her and kissed her on her nose, forehead, temples, ear, whispering "Good morning mi vida!" and letting slip away every bad thought.

"I've the most beautiful mother in the world!" Anna said to Santana who gave to her little girl one of her smiles.

Brittany looked at the two and when the corners of Santana's mouth touched her cheekbones and dimples appeared in her cheeks she couldn't help but melt into laughter. Santana looked at her as she answered her daughter "And I have the most beautiful daughter of the whole universe!"

Even Anna laughed and turned to face Brittany and all three were laughing and Anna felt so happy because even her mom seemed so happy and also because Brittany seemed happy and Anna knew that there was something for which they should not be so happy that morning, but she just couldn't remember what.

"How did you know I was awake?" Anna asked again to Brittany while Santana was still holding the girl, as if that sick little body was the most powerful shield to protect her from the blonde.

Brittany shrugged "Well ... I smelled you while you were roaming around us!"

Anna laughed "No, not true!" She said to Brittany.

"It's true! I swear!" Doc Brie said, and Anna thought she was really a genius because she always knew how to say things. She always made her smile.

A silence filled the room. Santana was frightened by silence, those who leave your torments scream inside your head, that silence was all this but it was also something else: there was no tension, no nervousness, and it seemed that there was just peace.

"May I smell you, too?" Brittany laughed and Santana's eyes widened scolding her daughter.

"Anna you cannot ask such a thing! I've already told you a hundred times!"

"Why not Mami, she smelled me!" Anna replied.

Brittany preceded Santana before she could say anything else "Of course you can!"

Anna tried to get out from her mother's embrace, but Santana didn't want to leave her, if she had freed her, if she had let her go, she would have nobody to protect her, she would be vulnerable again, fragile. But Anna protested moaning and Santana released the muscles of her arms. "Excuse her, she has just that thing about smelling people she likes!" Santana addressed Brittany without looking at her in the eyes and Brittany replied that there were no problems and opened her arms welcoming Anna who without wasting time buried her nose in Brittany's neck and sniffed her scent. "You smell like... I don't know what it is, but I like it!"

White musk and jasmine and Brittany. Santana knew exactly what that rosy skin smelled like and how good it was but didn't say it out, she just remembered that smell keeping her eyes fixed on her hands in her lap. But when she heard "And you smell like your mom." she couldn't help but look back and met the lethal smile of that woman but this time it was worse because it was addressed to her daughter and the two looked at each other and smiled and discussed about blond-haired fairies and they touched each other and caressed and braided their hair one another and they fell in love with each other and Santana had an urgent need to cry because that woman had no right to trap her little girl in her spell as she had done so many years before with her, but instead she found herself to smile, smile inwardly because seeing those two together filled her with sweetness and lightness.

Then someone knocked on the door. A slight and timid tap tap. Only Santana heard the sound, the other two were busy in a conversation that didn't include her and of which, frankly, Santana had missed the outlines from the beginning lost in the mist of her feelings.

"Come in!" Santana said, unable to take her eyes off the other side of the sofa absently thinking some nurses was at the door.

Rachel opened the door and was invaded by the unexpected laughter of Anna. She had imagined that Santana had spent a night in hell, and that she woke up grunting and cursing in Spanish and she had imagined that Anna had started to scold her and the two had begun to discuss and that Anna was crying and Santana was panic-stricken trying to calm her down.

Santana was a wonderful mother, Rachel was shocked at that thought, but it was the truth. She was caring, attentive, she understood Anna's moods, she listened her daughter and talked to her, so much. She played with her and she always found new experiences for her to live and she taught her songs and told stories. She had taught her to choose, to listen to her own feelings and needs, she had taught her the importance of family and friendship and that love is great and boundless. But something had changed with the disease. Santana's fears had made her tougher, colder, more closed. She was no longer so willing to talk, and not even to show her emotions, she swallowed and swallowed each node in her throat because she had to be strong, or so she said, but she had become a little less Santana and went back to be a bit more Snixx. And Anna didn't like Snixx.

Rachel was even more surprised when she opened the door and her eyes caught sight of an image she didn't expect: she saw Anna, in the arms of a woman who she immediately recognized as Brittany, she had not changed that much. And she heard her unmistakable chuckle, similar to one of a child, while Anna coiffed her hair and she saw Santana who, at that sight, tilted her head and smiled. Rachel took a step back because what she saw seemed too private, too personal and she didn't want to interrupt and especially she didn't want that the person who was behind her, not Kurt, but the other, see the intimacy of the moment. But Kurt, who was right behind her, pushed her forward for not tumble on Karen. Rachel slammed into the door which flung open with a sudden noise that broke the spell that was happening in the sofa bed. Santana turned and the smile died on her lips, Brittany looked up over Anna's head and she painted her face red, Anna's eyes widened eyeing the three people who stayed in an awkward silence on the door.

"Hey my little chestnut!" eventually Rachel said and opened her arms to welcome the little girl who slipped from Brittany's lap and went to take her aunt's hug.

Santana saw Rachel and saw Kurt and immediately remembered why she was there, in that hospital, that morning, but when she saw that Karen looked at her with a guilty look and looked at Brittany with some curiosity and indignation, a burst of anger ran through her breastbone. Why was she there? They decided that she was not coming, Santana had asked her not to come because she knew perfectly well that Karen wasn't one of Anna's favorite people and that her presence would have irritated and annoyed the little girl and Anna had rather to be quiet; instead Karen was there, in front of her and looked at Brittany with curiosity and indignation. Santana got up from the couch determined to find out what was going on and walked haughty towards the door purposely avoiding to shift her gaze on Brittany and purposely avoiding to look at her little girl greeting Kurt and Rachel, her head straight ready to face the woman who was left on the door, but Kurt intercepted her and stopped her and held her, forcing her to look in his direction.

"Santana, we're all here for you..." Kurt said and hugged her.

Brittany felt her cheeks and her neck and ears burning. She got up and began to gather her things, the jacket, the phone, the purse, trying to stay busy because the only thing she wanted to do was to get out, get out of that room and of that situation, but between her and the exit there were a lot of people she would have preferred not to see that morning. She didn't know what was got into her. As soon as Rachel and Kurt had entered that room she had felt restless, anxious. She wondered why they were there. But the truth was that she wondered why _she_ was there. She had the feeling that she shouldn't be there at all. She had no right to stay in that room, with Santana, with Anna. She was nothing for them, Kurt and Rachel and that woman came along with them, they had to stand next to Santana, they were her family. She saw it in Kurt's eyes when he had looked into Santana's eyes and Santana had settled in his arms and had held him tightly to his waist. She saw it in Anna's joy while talking to Rachel and telling her everything about Italy. She saw it in Rachel, when she had given Anna to Kurt and had shaken Santana's hands and they had looked into each others eyes, without saying a word, and then Rachel had squeezed her face and standing up on her toes had kissed her forehead hugging her. She saw it in that woman's eyes who stood on the sidelines and every time that Brittany was able to look up, the woman was staring at her and her eyes ran between her and Santana.

And the more the other three were exchanging greetings, the more Brittany's embarrassment grew and the few minutes they spent in that strange energy, seemed like hours, and the fire on her face didn't want to dim at all. Because she had left, but they had remained next to Santana, and perhaps they had comforted her, and they had laughed and cried with her and had done things and shared a lifetime and they were still there. But not her. She had run away? She asked herself. In the last fifteen years she had firmly believed she had made a choice, and the right one, but now, now that they were there as a family, Brittany was not so sure. She had left them all behind, without a word, without a goodbye. Because it was too painful. It had been too painful. What should she tell them? Maybe they hated her, maybe they had reason to hate her. She remained standing there, in front of the sofa with her jacket leaning on her hands joined in front of her belly looking at the floor until two feet appeared in her field of vision and she felt a hand touch her arm. Brittany looked up and in front of her was Rachel smiling.

"Hello Brittany."

Brittany smiled shyly and soon Kurt reached and embraced her and soon after even Rachel embraced her and Brittany found herself wrapped tightly by the memory of teenage years and by the warmth of those days when everything was new and exciting, by the adrenaline of the moment before going on stage to perform, by alcoholic parties in basements, by songs sung facing Professor Shue, by the faces of the Glee Club, and their smiles and their dramas. In that quick hug she remembered them all, she had idealized them, they had become almost like the protagonists of some TV shows, the one you love and live every day, but then all of a sudden it ends and you feel that a part of you is ended with it and that the actors will be engaged in other work and you will see them in other roles with their incredible beauty, but they will never again be those characters and you can do anything to get them back.

"Oh my God Britt I didn't think I would ever see you again!" Kurt said as he loosened the embrace.

"Brittany Susan Pierce it was here you were hiding then." Rachel reached a slight punch in Brittany's shoulder "When I saw the picture Anna sent to us, the vegan pancake I was eating for breakfast nearly went down to the wrong pipe. You know I always wondered how did you disappear without a trace ... "

Rachel spoke, as usual, she started one of her monologues that Brittany had never been able to follow, but she didn't miss the allusion to a certain picture sent by Anna and Brittany didn't know what she was talking about.

"...and especially what kind of adult you would become, what job would you do..."

"What picture?" Brittany asked, but at that moment Anna ran to her and hugged her legs.

"You're leaving Doc Brie?" Anna pointed to the jacket Brittany had in her hand and Brittany knelt down to have her face at the same height of the child. She first cast a glance toward Santana and saw her approaching the other woman who was still on the door. Then bring her attention back to Anna.

"Yes, young lady."

"You wont be there for my surgery?" Anna looked at her with her big dark hopeful eyes and Brittany looked at Santana again to see if the pact they had done the night before was still valid, and especially if Santana still needed it and this time Santana was directed towards her and looked at her and her eyes were so much like Anna's and she had the same hopeful look.

"Sure I'll be there! I'll be right next to you in the operating room, may be ok?"

"Really? You're not kidding me? "

Brittany shook her head, "Uh-uh! I never make fun of sweet young ladies like you."

Anna laughed and Brittany touched the unicorn dangling from the girl's tiny neck.

"I'm not afraid, you know, Doc Brie?"

Brittany looked at the little girl in the eyes and the look of all the other adults in the room shifted toward them.

"You're not?" Brittany asked and Anna shook her head. Brittany felt the eyes of the other on her skin, but facing Anna that sense of inappropriateness she had felt just moments before was gone. Anna trusted her and entrusted herself to her. Anna's eyes were firm and proud, mimicking very well her mother's stubbornness and at the same time they were so sweet and full of vitality.

"I know you're a very brave girl." Brittany looked at Santana maybe because those words were directed more to her than to the child. At five year old no one's afraid of a surgery.

Anna nodded, "I'm like a unicorn?"

Brittany laughed and leaned her forehead to Anna's. Even Kurt laughed and exchanged a confused look with Rachel whispering in her ear so that no one hear "Are we sure Anna's not her daughter?" And Rachel shook her head and sighed. There was a strange energy in that room a strong energy, very very strong.

"Sure! You are a unicorn!" Then she kissed Anna's forehead and stood up placing a hand on the girl's head caressing lightly it and without saying goodbye to anyone else but smiling shyly to each, she walked towards the door. Before leaving her gaze fell into Santana's hands intertwined with that woman's. It hurt.

When Brittany was out of the room Santana left Karen's hand. She didn't know why she had grabbed her when she saw Brittany getting up, she was still angry with Karen, no, she was furious with her who had not complied with her request. She had grabbed that hand to make it clear to the blonde what was her life now, what were the boundaries, she was absolutely sure of her reasons. But when Santana had felt that Brittany would leave the room in a few moments, her chest squeezed tight and that hand was there, next to her, to support her. Santana left the hold and walked away from Karen, now the only thing she wanted was to throw her out of that room, but she said nothing, she left her hand and went to Anna, picked her up and carried her in the bed, because she had bare feet, she wasn't wearing socks or slippers and could catch a cold.

"Where's Finn?" Santana asked Rachel and Kurt.

"He's in the hotel with Blaine to help him get the twins ready, but he'll soon be here." Rachel replied.

"And Quinn?" The woman at the door moved but no one paid any attention to her.

"Her plane has not landed yet, she'll come later." Said Rachel again and Santana nodded.

"When did you arrive Aunt Rach?" Anna asked.

"We arrived last night and I, chestnut, I wanted to come straight here but dad forced me to stay in the hotel because he told me your mother was not in the best of moods, so I chose to come here this morning, you know your Mami!"

"Yes, I know her!" Anna laughed.

Santana rolled her eyes and looked at her watch, it was 8:25.

"Mami I'm hungry, can I get some breakfast?"

"Anna, I'm sorry, but you can't eat anything this morning, I told you, soon there will be nurses and they'll bring you something to drink, okay?"

"But I'm hungry ...! My belly is grumbling!"

"But you're a unicorn, unicorns don't complain that way!" Kurt said, sitting down on the bed beside her. "Want to know a really nice story about unicorns?"

"You know stories about unicorns Uncle Kurt?"

"Oh yes, I was once a unicorn too!"

"No?"

"Yes, and one person told me this story many years ago, do you want to listen to it?" He searched in his mind the words Brittany said to him at the beginning of their Senior year, during the campaign for Senior President. "So let's see, when a horse or maybe it was a pony, however, when one of these two do a good deed a horn grows out in its head and it becomes a unicorn, and then I think it makes a cotton candy poop..."

"Ew, I would never eat the poop of a unicorn, even if it was cotton candy! And the pee?"

"The pee? Well I don't know, pee may be strawberry juice!"

"Cool!" The two laughed "And maybe the unicorn does it in a large tub and fairies gather it in bottles and bring it to the supermarkets for people to buy!"

"Anna this is disgusting!"

"No, it's not! If they don't know what they're drinking it's not disgusting! Maybe we ate unicorn poop a lot of times without knowing it!" Anna replied unable to keep from laughing.

While Santana "Stop talking about excrement and body fluids with my young daughter, Elizabeth!" said because she knew very well that this was one of Brittany's stories and Brittany was already everywhere in that room. She walked over to Karen who still had not moved from her position near the door.

"Creepy!" Kurt whispered to Rachel nodding in the direction of Karen and Rachel nodded.

"Hey Uncle Kurt, and then what?"

"Well, and then when they forget to be magical their horn falls off!"

"Oh, that's sad! Why?" Said Anna hunching her lower lip.

"Well, it happens when someone forget they're the special, magical, unique creature they are!" Kurt said kissing Anna's forehead.

"What's that even mean? How a unicorn can forget to be a unicorn?"

"Believe me, it happens! But I'm almost convinced that eventually they become zebras!"

"Zebras are unicorns?" Anna was dubious about what turn his uncle's story was taking.

"They're ex-unicorns, I guess…"

Anna shook her head "You're not very good at telling this story uncle! And I liked best the part of the poop!"

Meanwhile, Santana reached Karen. Anna was quiet, Rachel and Kurt were with her and she had to deal with that woman before the routine of the morning, the one that Dr. Patrice had explained and re-explained her and some other nurse had remembered her, overflow her completely. She had to know why Karen was there.

"Why are you here? And most of all why didn't you tell me you were coming?"

"What is it? I messed up your plans?" Karen stood leaning against the wall next to the door, with her head lowered but she looked straight into Santana's eyes. Santana had never considered her particularly beautiful, she had a small mouth that wasn't proportioned with her nose and her square jaw, and her short hair accentuated her face's flaws, but she had a couple of disarming gray-green eyes and a young and muscular body and above all she knew what was her place, she was a soldier and she knew what it meant to respect rules and do not exceed boundaries and Santana had put so many rules and so many boundaries. In the end, relationships were all about boundaries: if you build a well-fortified castle and equip it with a moat and a drawbridge and put archers to watch over the watchtowers then no one will dare to break through your walls. Santana was the undisputed queen of her castle and she needed to feel safe, she no longer wanted to be hurt. That girl, Karen, who now was looking at her, she had no right to lean a ladder and try to climb those walls, not after they had decided that she would not do it. She had betrayed her trust, she had tried to overrun.

"What are you implying?" Santana said cold and whispering because her words disperse behind the chatter and laughter of the other three occupants of the room.

"I know who is her, the woman just come out of here!"

Santana laughed bitter "So what?"

"So you didn't want me to come to do your own business with that ... ghost?"

This was too much for Santana. Not only Karen had come to Italy after she had asked her not to, she had come with the express purpose of watching her "Really Karen? Really did you come here to control me? You flew to 4000 miles, you spent hundreds of dollars just to come and control me! You really want to talk about this on my daughter's surgery day? "

Karen looked down when she realized she was doing it all wrong "I, no, I'm sorry ... no ... it's just that I saw her with you, with Anna and ..."

"Are you sorry now? I am sorry that you haven't done the one thing I asked you to do! I'm sorry you came here for nothing, when there was no need to come, I'm sorry that you care so little about my daughter!" Santana was a bitch and then? Today she was supposed to think of Anna, Anna and Anna only. She didn't want all these complications, she didn't care for anyone but her daughter and didn't want to argue or even to speak. Brittany. The image of the smile the blonde had given her the night before rose to her mind. Why?

"You asked me to sit at home, you realize how difficult it is to know that the person you love is thousands miles away from you and is suffering? Do you understand how hard it is and painful to be able to do nothing? But what do you know you ... what do you know about love!"

Santana listened to the girl in front of her, who fortunately was whispering, but it was as if the words she was saying had no meaning at all. It wasn't the first time the young woman told her she loved her and "It's not safe for you to love me." Santana had told her the first time and "You're young, you may find a real girl, why me?" she had answered the second time and "I'm not the type to play the girlfriends in love." she had told her the third time and then she just stopped answering something, because Santana didn't love her, she liked her, of curse, but everything with her was cold and dry, no emotion that filled her inside. Santana thought she was no longer capable of loving, she had had her chance, she kept telling herself, she was convinced she would never feel the fire burn every bowels of her body again. She got even closer to that so arrogant girl to spit in her face a few sharp words but the door opened and Marco appeared with a dressing cart filled with vials and cups and other things Santana didn't have time to check. The moment had come, and her heart sank hurting. She put her hand to her chest and closed her eyes. Karen patted that hand but Santana pushed away from her.

"Good morning everyone! There's a lot of people in this room! All your friends Anna?" Marco asked always in a good mood.

"Good morning lighthand Marco! These are my aunt Rachel and uncle Kurt."

"Lighthand, honey?" Kurt got out of bed and reached for the nurse who shook his hand. "Kurt Hummel, it's really a pleasure to meet you, I cannot imagine why they call you so ..."

Santana moved leaving Karen in the same place she was from the moment she entered, as if she was only a meaningless piece of furniture, and reached the nurse "Anderson!"

"What?" Kurt asked.

"Stop flirting Lady Anderson, you're married!"

"I'm not flirting at all? Mine is just legitimate curiosity Satan."

"Technically yes, Kurt you were flirting, and right now your husband is with my children and therefore I would ask you not to let you go to any lascivious demonstration of interest towards another human being while he's with them!" Before Rachel could rush into a monologue about why it wasn't fair, Santana cut her off.

"Hey, okay, shut up!" Then she turned to the nurse, "Sorry Marco, you came here for Anna."

"Yes, I came to get you something to drink, I bet you're hungry!" The nurse spoke to the girl.

"Yes, I am!" Anna moaned, rubbing her belly with her hand and pouting.

"What do you want? Tea? Chamomile? "

"Can I have some cookies?" Anna asked looking Marco hopefully with her deep brown eyes.

"I'm sorry Anna and trust me I could do whatever you want if you keep looking at me with these wonderful eyes, but not this , I'm really sorry, your tummy must be empty!" Anna nodded, because she knew she didn't have to eat, even if it was unfair. "So what do you want?"

"What I take Mami?"

Santana walked over to Anna and saw that Anna couldn't decide, Marco left them both tea and chamomile and then gave Santana an antibacterial soap with whom she would have to wash the girl. And as he was leaving Finn came in with the Lopez and Marco pointed out to everyone that there were too many people in that room and that someone would have to wait outside until Anna was ready. Karen was the first to go out, without anyone telling her to do so. Without anyone noticing she had gone. Then the grandparents came out because their eyes were full of tears and it was wrong, terribly wrong that Anna could see the concern in their eyes and then Kurt came out with the excuse of going to call Blaine but feeling the tension rise liquid in his eyes as the time passed.

"I go to prepare the water for the bath." Rachel proposed and Finn and Santana lay down on the bed and made Anna lie down between them. The three smiled awkwardly for something clumsy Finn had done, as usual, and Rachel sighed going into the bathroom and closed the door behind her.


	9. Chapter 82

Chapter 8

Part two

Brittany had slipped in Roy's office, as soon as she had left Anna's room, to breath. She didn't think she would make it to hold everything was going on in those days. She just needed to get away from it all, breathe properly, regain her normality. But she knew that that wasn't the right day. She had promised to Santana to stay with her. But why? Her head ached, she wanted to stop thinking. She had always said that thinking too much hurt. She pulled out her cell phone and turned it on. There was a message and a lost call from Bryan. The message asked her what had happened the previous night and to call him as soon as possible. Brittany replied to the message with another very similar and asked her son to call her as soon as possible. It was 9:30 and Bryan was in school, third hour, and soon the bell would be rung for the break and he was going to call her. She waited sitting in Roy's chair, resting on the reclined backrest and closing her eyes. A few minutes later Roy walked in.

"Che cazzo Brie, mi hai spaventato! Che ci fai qui?" (_"What the fuck Brie, you scared me! What are you doing here?"_)

"Buongiorno anche a te Dottor Patrice!" (_"Good morning to you Dr. Patrice!"_)

"Ok, buongiorno, che ci fai qui di sabato mattina, non dovresti essere a casa?" (_"Okay, good morning, what are you doing here on a Saturday morning? Shouldn't you be home?"_)

"Devi farmi un favore Roy…" (_"You must do me a favor Roy ..."_)

"Che favore?" (_"What for?"_) Roy asked worried, because when Brittany looked at him that way, with that pout and those doe eyes, he knew she was going to ask for something that would not pleased him.

"Devi lasciarmi venire in sala operatoria oggi…" (_"You have to let me come to the operating room today..."_) she said without looking away and blushing slightly.

"Che? È uno scherzo, vero?" (_"What? It's a joke, right?"_) Roy's mind immediately went to the girl of the room down the north hallway.

"No, ho promesso a Santana che sarei stata insieme ad Anna…" (_"No, I promised Santana that I would be with Anna..."_)

"Hai promesso cosa a chi? Oddio Brie veramente?" (_"You promised what to whom? Oh God Brie really?"_) Brittany nodded and Roy slapped himself in the face because Brittany was an ace in putting herself in weird situations. "E perché mai? E quando glielo avresti promesso?" (_"And why is that? And when you'd promised?"_)

"Stanotte, era così spaventata…" (_"Tonight, she was so scared..."_)

"Stanotte?" (_"Tonight?"_) Ok, now Roy was really worried because only a few days before he had caught those two fighting and now she was telling him she had somehow spent the night with that woman. Roy had not wanted to know anything, he no longer had asked for anything to Brittany about her past with the American, his mind had given only a face to that Great American Love he had heard so much about in those years, but he had tried not to go further, he had to operate the girl in the most professional way he could. He didn't doubt himself, but when it came to Brittany, he was not very clear headed. Brittany was so fragile and so genuine and pure and the other woman, Santana, he was afraid she would hurt her. He watched her lower her gaze embarrassed.

"Si, senti Roy io…" (_"Yes, listen Roy I..."_)

"No, non voglio sapere niente e no, non ti lascio venire in sala operatoria!" (_"No, I don't want to know anything and no, I don't let you come into the OR!"_)

"Ok, starò fuori dalla sala operatoria, anche perché non ci tengo proprio ad entrare dentro, non ci tengo proprio a vedere mentre le apri il petto e fai tutte quelle cose che devi fare al suo cuore, io me ne starò fuori e tu ogni mezz'ora mi dici come sta andando e io vado a riferire a Santana…ok?" (_"Ok, I'll be out of the operating room, because I just don't care to get inside, I just don't care to see while you open her chest and do all those things you need to do to her heart, I'll stay out and every half an hour you tell me how it's going on and I'll go to report to Santana...ok?"_)

"No!" Brittany was like a child at times, so full of hope and expectations and had a huge heart.

"Come on Roy, I gave her my word..."

"Senza prima consultarmi! Hai dato la tua parola senza prima chiedere il mio parere o il mio consenso!" (_"Without consulting me first! You gave your word without first asking my opinion or my consent!"_) And like a child at times she was so maddening.

"Come on..." Brittany pouted and looked at him again and she knew that he would surrender to that look.

"Ok…Dio Brie a volte mi sembri così…" (_"Ok... God Brie sometimes you seem so..."_)

"Stupida?" (_"Stupid?"_) Brittany promptly finished the sentence for Roy.

"…ingenua! Che cosa pensavi di fare?" (_"...naive! What were you thinking?"_)

"Non lo so, non pensavo. Mi è venuto così di istinto cercare di darle una mano. Non pensavo, lo sai che spesso faccio cose senza pensare, aveva bisogno di me, volevo solo alleviare un po' del suo dolore, non lo so Roy, hai detto ok?" (_"I don't know, I didn't think. It came so instinctively try to give her a hand. I didn't think, you know I often do things without thinking, she needed me, I just wanted to relieve some of her pain, I don't know Roy. You said ok?"_)

Roy sighed "Si!" (_"Yes!"_)

"SIIII!" (_"Yeeeah!"_) Brittany hugged him jumping into his arms and Roy shook his head and looked up at the sky, removing from her hug.

"Come stai?" (_"How are you?"_) Then he asked the woman and Brittany shrugged.

"Sopraffatta? Confusa? Al settimo cielo? Non lo so Roy, lei è…" (_"Overwhelmed? Confused? On cloud nine? I don't know Roy, she is ..."_)

Brittany's phone, which she had placed on the desk of Roy's office, rang. Brittany grabbed it and saw the smiling face of her son on the screen.

"Hallo!" She spoke the phone and looked at Roy who understood and then she left the office.

"Che è successo stanotte Ma? Dove sei andata?" (_"What happened tonight Ma? Where did you go?"_)

"In ospedale, sono ancora qui. Ma non è successo niente. Come stai te amore?" (_"At the hospital, I'm still here. But nothing happened. How are you my love?"_) Brittany leaned against the wall next to the door as she spoke with her son. The hospital was quivering like every day. Nurses, patients and parents moved like so many ants each with their own thoughts and each with the lives they bore within them. There were those who chattered, who was crying, who stood motionless, staring into space, those who laughed, who was playing, who looked around but could not find a direction where to go, who was running after something.

"Ma, io sto bene, sono a scuola, come vuoi che stia!" (_"Ma, I'm fine, I'm at school, how do you think I am?"_)

"Hey! Control the way you talk to me!" Brittany scold him smiling. Because as far as in less than a week her life had been turned upside down, kneaded, squeezed, Bryan was her anchorage and hearing him, hearing his voice, it was so comforting.

"Ok, mi dispiace, ma dimmi che è successo!" (_"Ok, I'm sorry, but tell me what happened!"_)

"Santana, my friend from high school, she was scared, very scared because today her little girl has surgery and last night she called me and I came to see what was happening, and then I fell asleep in the girl's room, that's all." It was the truth. Maybe.

"And why she called you? She not even know you anymore, and it seems to me that so far she has treated you like shit ... "

"Bryan!"

"...and then all of a sudden she calls you? I don't understand, Ma! I just don't understand!" There was nothing to understand. It was clear, it was normal to rush to Santana in time of need, it was normal and right, at any time and in any place, but she realized that it was difficult for others to understand her and Brittany didn't have a logical explanation. Maybe it was not so normal.

"I know, it just happened, okay Bry? I don't know why she called me, it just happened and I didn't have the heart to deny her my help. "

"Okay, fine, forget it." Because sometimes it was better to leave her alone rather than understand the reasons for his mother. Sometimes she was so open and simple to comprehend, like a picture, other times she was hermetic like a cipher. "Since you're in the hospital, you pick me up when I get out to school? I don't want to get back home by train!"

"No Bryan, I'm going to stay for the operation as well."

"What? Why?" Because Santana still needed her. Or maybe because Brittany needed to be near Santana. She didn't answer.

"You could stay in Florence, though, you and Eleonora could stay in Florence and Luciana and me, we can catch up later with you and hang out together mothers/children like old times. We could go for a movie and then to The Flog to see if there's some nice concert. What do you think?"

It had been years that all four didn't hang out together mothers/children. It was a Saturday night habit when Bryan and Eleonora were younger. When Brittany moved to Italy Luciana was the first friendly face that greeted her with a smile on her lips. In a small village it's easy to be suspicious of someone who comes from far away, someone like Brittany, a naive pregnant teenager who didn't know a word of the language they spoke. But fate had willed that Luciana was pregnant too and that Luciana could speak English and that Luciana wasn't afraid of her and sharing the months of pregnancy were enough to tie the two although Luciana was six years older than Brittany. Eleonora was born on November 30 and less than a month later Bryan was born, on December 23, and three years later Federico, Luciana's companion had left and Luciana had lived for a while at Brittany's home and so they simply had become much more than friends and the two children had grown up together and Saturdays had always been mothers/children day: movies, dining out, amusement parks, picnics and all the two women invented for their children. She missed those times. But it wasn't for that reason that Brittany had suggested her son to go out, at least not for this alone. There was a sense of guilt, she knew last week she had neglected Bryan because she couldn't get out of her mind Anna and Santana, and she also needed to do something routine, something that back her to reality, the reality she had experienced in the last fifteen years, the one that should be her reality but that now seemed distant and imaginary. She had to regain her balance, because the whole situation was driving her crazy.

"Ok, I ask Ele and then let you know. What time you'll be done?"

Brittany heard rang a bell from the phone. Brittany felt guilty because probably, to phone her, his son had not even had breakfast.

"You have to go back to class!"

"Yes, I know, I'm going, what time you'll be done?"

"I think about 4."

"Okay, I'll call you!"

"Be careful!"

"Sempre, anche te!" (_"Always, even you!"_)

"Ok. Ciao amore!" (_"Ok. Bye love!"_)

"Ciao Ma!" (_"Bye Ma!"_) Bryan hung up. Brittany hung up and before going back to Roy's office, she sighed.

* * *

"Mami, can you tell me about the day I was born?" Santana looked at the clock in her phone. Since they had entered in that hospital she had looked at it hundreds of times, as if there, time had acquired another meaning, it was no longer the scan of the moments of the day, it had become the time left before to. The time left before meeting the doctor, the time left before tests results arrived, the time left before the next blood sampling, the time left before the surgery . It was 9:49.

"Mi vida, we told you a dozen times!" Santana pretended to be annoyed, but she liked to tell her daughter about that day and she liked to remember that day.

"So you tell me Papi, don't you?"

"Ok Anna anything you want!" Anna smiled and kiss her father on the tip of his nose. Finn laughed and patted her head and then began to speak.

"So, it was 2 in the morning and your mother was panicking ..."

"Shut up Alan Abel. First, it's not true, and second you can't start a story like that!"

"It's my story and I can start it as I want!"

"Don't argue please!" Anna asked and the two apologized and Santana let Finn speak.

"So your mother was panicking, because her water broke and she was alone at home and so stubborn to have told everyone that she wanted to give birth alone and didn't want anyone with her."

"What did she said Papi?"

"Two months earlier she had told us..." Finn started talking and soon after Anna joined him, she knew that story by heart, from her whole family's points of view, because she had forced all her relatives to tell her the story a thousand times and she knew all the lines, just like an old movie. "Hey you Trapp family, stay away from me because I don't want my daughter to come in to world sick of your cheery singing around her!" This was the romanticized and sweetened version that everyone had told Anna, in reality Santana had added some "fuck" and some "shit" in several points of the sentence. Santana rolled her eyes remembering that day and the other two laughed.

"Then what?"

"And then during the first contraction she started crying and called me desperately inventing the sink's faucet in the kitchen was broken and that her house was flooded and I had to go immediately to repair it because she was carrying my daughter and it was my duty to do things like that!"

"Finnsensitive, you're not able to tell this story, mine was just a metaphor for you to understand that I had broken water!"

Finn smiled, accustomed to Santana's fake hardness. "Okay, you tell it then!"

"Fine!" Anna turned to her mom and this time she kissed her on the tip of her nose. "So. I was scared because my water broke and I was alone in the house. I called a taxi to go to the hospital, but while waiting for the taxi I couldn't stop thinking about Papi and the fact that I didn't want you to be born without him. I haven't spoken with him and Aunt Rach for two months because I had convinced myself I didn't need anyone and that I could be very well all by myself, but while you pushed and you struggled to be born, I couldn't think of anything but Finn: he was your dad and I would have hated myself all my life if I had not allowed him to participate in your birth."

Anna looked at Santana without saying a word, it was true, Mami was better at telling this story. Anna knew that her mom was a homosexual and that, to make a baby, you need sperm and egg and therefore need a man and a woman, and she also knew well that the love which she was born from was not what you see in movies, because her mom didn't like men in that way. And many times Mami had told her that she was the most beautiful gift that Papi and Aunt Rach had done to her, but also Papi and Aunt Rach always said that she was the most beautiful gift Santana had done them. Sometimes adults were just strange, but knowing that she was a gift for all of these people made her feel really good.

"Then I called Papi and told him that the faucet was broken and he, as usual, didn't understand and told me that there were plumbers for this type of problem, but in the end, I kindly..."

"Kindly?" Finn protested and Anna chuckled.

"... I kindly explained to him you were going to be born and I said he had to go immediately at Lenox Hill and I would come by taxi. And then he panicked and while he woke up Aunt Rach, he forbade me to take the taxi and without lifting the handset from his ear he tried to dress helped by Rachel, telling me to stay calm and that they would bring me to the hospital..."

"And when I was ready, I ran to the door of the room thinking I was talking on mobile and so I snatched the phone from the wall and..." Finn started to speak but Rachel cut him off.

"And if I hadn't been there with my self-control due to the myriad of hours spent exercising breathing techniques to improve my vocal and my strength, and aided by the experimental method of Dr. Thomas F. Denson, that suggested to exercise to use the non-dominant hand in small daily actions, you'd probably be born in a car on Lexington Avenue!" All three laughed. "The bath is ready Anna, come on!"

It was only then that Santana switch off. Until that moment it had been all so calm, almost like another normal day of a normal week. But that bath was the beginning of the process that would lead the surgery. Santana did everything she was told to do, step by step helped by Finn and Rachel: she prepared her daughter, signed the last paper, waited for Dr. Patrice, waited for the nurses, put Anna on the hospital bed, held her hand. Everything as it should be done. But she wasn't really there, her ears recorded the sounds, her mouth synthesized words but her mind was elsewhere, in a limbo with no thoughts and no feelings. As soon as the nurse opened the door's bedroom, Brittany was out there. They were all there, the Lopezes, Kurt, Blaine, Karen, but above all there was Brittany, she had kept her promise and she was there, smiling at Anna as she held her hand and told her she would be with her in the operating room. And when Brittany shook hands with Anna, Anna left her mother's.

"I'll be fine Mami!" Anna said to Santana, looking into her eyes and then took off the necklace that Brittany had given her and gave it to Santana smiling. "Can you keep it save for me, Mami?" Anna asked and Santana nodded. "Mami?" Anna caught her attention while Santana's eyes were fixed on the pendant unicorn lying on her hand.

"You'll be fine mi vida!" Santana rested her forehead on her girl's, and with her hand grasped Anna's that was intertwined with Brittany's.

"I know." Anna replied.

Brittany looked down at their clasped hands. She knew very well what it was. Santana was silently asking to be near to her daughter. Brittany knew it, because at some point children grow and a mother can't be present in every moment of their lives and then she hopes there is someone out there in the world that love them and respect them enough and take care of them. At that moment, Santana had to leave her daughter, she couldn't go any further. The nurse was rolling the bed to the elevator and Brittany knew that Santana knew that once the doors open Santana could do nothing more for her daughter except hope or pray. She wanted to hug her but instead "Santana." She said as the elevator doors opened and Santana kissed Anna on her forehead and Finn and Rachel did the same and before the others could approach, Anna started to wave her hand repeating to everyone "See you later, don't go away!"

And when they were alone in the elevator Anna turned to Brittany. "Hey Doc Brie could I give the pendant to my mom? Do you mind? "

"Of course not, young lady, I'm happy your mom look after it!"

Anna was not crying, not screaming, not hysterically calling her parents and perhaps this was due to the small dose of sedative that had been given to her, but Brittany thought Anna was the bravest girl she had ever known.

"Are you coming inside with me Doc Brie?" The girl asked as the elevator arrived at its destination and now the hospital bed was pushed down a yellow and green colored hallway.

"Sure!" Brittany said as the operating room doors were opened and Dr. Patrice greeted Anna with a scrub cap painted with skulls and swords. He had a surgical mask and an eye patch.

"Hey hub!" He said, turning to the nurse with a low, husky voice. "Who have you brought me today?" Anna looked around and everyone else in the room wore the same scrub cap and someone had the eye patch and one of them even had a hook instead of a hand which he scratched his head with. "Ok, who is this boy?" pirate Patrice asked.

"I'm not a boy, it's me, Anna, Dr. Roy!" Anna protested showing her long hair. Then Dr. Patrice lifted the patch eye up and the man with the hook, threw off the hook a bit annoyed.

"What do you mean you're Anna?"

"Yes, I'm really Anna!"

Dr. Patrice took the medical record that was on the hospital bed, and gave it a look "You really are Anna!" he said and "I told you!" Anna replied.

"Doc Brie!" Dr. Patrice turned to Brittany as if to scold her. "If you had told me that there would be Anna I would put my tutu!" And made a clumsy dance step while nurses transferred Anna in the operating table.

"You're not very good at dancing Dr. Roy!" Anna said sincerely but with a smile on her lips. "You should teach him Doc Brie!"

"Believe me Anna, I tried!" Brittany said while the anesthesiologist place the needle for anesthesia "I also placed him in the little girls class but they were too good compared to him!" Brittany chuckled.

"Hey Anna, can you count?" Roy asked.

"Sure!" Anna said upset by that Dr. Roy's a bit stupid question, she was nearly six, of course she could count!

"Even in Spanish?" Roy asked again, and the girl gave him a look of challenge and started to count.

"Uno... dos... tres... cuatro... cinco… seis..."

Anna fell asleep and Brittany sighed, while Roy gave orders to his team what to do. Brittany gave a last look at the girl and left the operating room. "Half an hour Roy…" she asked before exiting while her heart was pounding and a feeling of nausea invading her stomach.

"Brie, esci da questa stanza, dobbiamo lavorare!" (_"Brie, go out this room, we have to work!"_) He ordered Brittany but she knew that a little later he would send someone to inform her about the progress of the surgery and in fact exactly 37 minutes after a nurse came out.

"La bambina sta bene, i cardiochirurghi hanno appena effettuato la sternotomia e stanno incidendo il pericardio e mettendo a nudo il cuore e gli altri vasi." and then she came back fast in the O.R.

Sternotomia, sterno, sternum, breastbone. Brittany tried to mentally translate the words that the nurse had just reported as she walked toward the elevator. When they were together, Roy had tried to give her some small basics of cardiac anatomy, but the basics he had given her was too confusing and too abstract and too many. So Roy had given her a plastic model of a heart that could be assembled and disassembled like a puzzle and in every part of it was written its name. And Brittany was able to learn them all but the names were in Italian and learning them in Italian she just didn't know how to translate some of them. The elevator went up while Brittany was looking for a way to translate _pericardio_, maybe it was just as easy as _sterno_, perhaps it was enough to replace the _o_ with _um_. She kept her mind busy for not thinking about the true meaning of those words. The girl was fine but the surgeons have just opened her chest and now were exposing the heart and other blood vessels. Brittany shivered. The elevator doors opened.

12:41. The first time Brittany went into the waiting room to report to Santana, she was set apart from the rest of the group. Rachel was close between Finn and Kurt all three sat on the couch and when they saw her enter they stood up in unison, like a choir and went to meet her. The Lopezes sat on chairs, motionless and embraced side by side like the statues in the _Sarcophagus of a Married Couple_, and stared at her from head to toe whispering. The girl Brittany had seen in the morning was in a corner of the room with her arms crossed and she looked like a ghost, her presence was inconsistent and imperceptible. Santana was standing with her back to the rest of the group in front of the window, staring into the white sky of clouds and her black and wavy hair fell on her shoulders like Dali's painting. Santana didn't hear Brittany arrive, but she heard Finn, Rachel and Kurt move and shifted her gaze on the blonde. With the face switched off, absent, Santana came up to Brittany and listened to her words without any emotion then return immediately to the window and get lost again in thoughts.

13:19. The second time Brittany reached the group nothing much had changed, only the Lopezes stood next to Santana but without touching her and without speaking to her. She explained to everyone that doctors were connecting the veins to the heart-lung machine.

14:00. The third time, Quinn was also in the room, she was talking to Rachel and when Brittany smiled at her, Quinn looked straight into her eyes and her gaze was not friendly at all, she seemed angry, full of hatred and tired. Brittany reported that doctors were removing the damaged valve and Santana wrapped her arms around her chest and her face contorted involuntarily in a grimace of pain because she knew very well what that meant, it meant that her daughter's heart was still. That girl moved from the corner and approached the group. Brittany saw her caress Santana's back and her heart sank but Santana broke from the comfort the girl offered and went back in front of the window.

14:34. The fourth time, Santana was not there and not even the girl in the corner. Brittany thought they were together, but as she approached the group the girl arrived and came over to Finn and Brittany told them that doctors were placing the artificial valve.

15:20. The fifth time Santana was walking frantically back and forth with her arms folded and her eyes facing the floor and it was the first time she spoke to Brittany.

"Why the surgery is not over yet? What are they doing? Something happened and you don't want to tell me?"

Santana's voice was strangled and her brow furrowed and her eyes wide open. She looked older, as if in those three hours and twenty minutes she had aged ten years. Santana grabbed Brittany by the arm the same a few days before she had strangled and Brittany felt a pang of pain reach her straight to her heart.

"No Santana." Brittany tried to be as calm as possible though inside her every viscera was shaking because in those three hours her body had been a receptacle of sensations and emotions: worry, fear, tenderness, anger, anxiety, courage, shame, love, pain, loneliness, pride. Maribel and the girl came quickly to Santana, the girl stroking her arm whose hand held Brittany's arm and Maribel rubbing a hand through her hair, but Santana sent away both with an abrupt movement of her arms and fixed her eyes on Brittany's .

"No Santana, it's okay. They reactivated her heart. It's all right." Saying this Brittany was touched. She felt the tears fill her eyes and she bit her lower lip to hide the trembling of her mouth. Santana's eyes turned red and Brittany saw her swallow.

"Did you hear it? Did you hear her heart?" Santana asked her and Brittany nodded and smiled no longer able to hold back the emotion that slid down her cheek. She smiled at Santana watching her chest rise and fall and her eyes that were frozen on hers and Brittany wondered if Santana understood what she had just said.

"Hey…" Brittany whispered, trying to wake Santana from her trance and touching her hand that was inert down her side.

"Did you hear her heart beating?" Santana asked again and Brittany smiled at her.

"Yes, I heard it." Brittany said, and Santana closed her eyes and sighed and put her hands on her chest and then turned to Finn who, leaned against the wall of the waiting room, was crying and smiling.

Brittany turned and took a step to go back to the operating room, but Santana's hand stopped her again locking onto her arm. "Where are you going?" Santana asked.

"In the operating room, they still need to... finish..." _sew up_ were the right words, but how could she tell her? Santana nodded, though seeming to have understood.

"Will you come back?" Santana asked her and Brittany tried to find a different meaning to that question, she wanted Santana to need her, but Santana just needed to know about her daughter.

Brittany smiled, "When the surgery is over." She said and walked away.

15:46. The sixth time Brittany came into the waiting room she did it laughing. It was over. The surgery was over and everything was fine. Anna was fine. A nurse was taking her in intensive care where she was supposed to stay for a few days, but she was fine. Yes, there was the post-operative, and the fear that side effects arise, but the surgery had been a success and Brittany announced this to all Anna's family and watched the relief came down from their eyes. For a while. Then she felt again that sense of intrusion. While all hugged each others and exchanged laughter and tears, Brittany felt again that she wasn't part of that. Brittany knew it was time to say goodbye and walk away. She had kept her promise, there was nothing else for her to do, but she couldn't, she couldn't go away.

Santana didn't attend to the joy of her family. She felt nothing. The surgery was over and yet she felt nothing, no relief, no comfort. Why? Why she couldn't feel anything? Why she couldn't share the joy of her family? Maybe she had hardened too much in these two years of Anna's illness? She had hardened enough to not feel anything anymore? But in front of her was Brittany and she couldn't realize why but Santana was going towards her, towards those blue eyes that looked at her smiling.

"Thank you." She told Brittany as soon as she was facing her, she said it coldly, because in her heart, at that moment, she felt nothing, not even gratitude.

Brittany shrugged. "I did nothing. Really." She replied. They stood in silence for a while face to face. Santana felt anesthetized. It was possible she felt nothing? And if for some supernatural reason she had stopped to feel?

"What am I going to do now?" The words came from her mouth involuntarily. What a stupid question, and without meaning. What did it mean? Maybe it was the flow of her thoughts, if she couldn't feel anything, what would she do? Maybe it meant that? Or maybe she was asking Brittany directions to go and see her daughter? She didn't know, shit, she didn't know, there was no meaning in that question, it was not a question that the blonde could answer, and yet she had just asked the question to her and Brittany tilted her head and her eyes warmed. Santana didn't have a better way to describe those eyes, they shone and became warm and Santana felt that warmth scroll beneath her skin.

"You can cry now." Brittany whispered, just four little words, but to Santana's ears they came like an epiphany and at that time she switch on again. Her heart began to pound and hot tears slid down her cheeks. She swallowed. She didn't want to cry. She mustn't cry. She couldn't cry, she had forbidden it to herself. But she couldn't restrain herself. "San ..." Brittany whispered again and Santana threw herself on her. She collided and pressed her body to the blonde's, she buried her eyes into Brittany's collarbone and grabbed the back of her white coat and started to sob. Santana felt Brittany envelop her with her arms and warmth enveloped her even more. She felt Brittany's cheek leaning on her head and words whispered in her ear, "It's ok ..." they kept saying. Santana felt a hand open and press her lower back and the other brush her hair and her shoulders and her back and again her hair and her shoulders and her back and.

Santana cried for all the tears she had not shed the last two years, she cried for the relief of the end of the surgery, she cried because now she could return thinking about her future and her daughter's, she cried for the love of her family, she cried because, for the first time in a long time, she felt fragile and so safe to show it, she cried because Brittany knew exactly that Santana needed to cry. And when she felt her legs become weak Brittany squeezed her even more, she embraced her holding her and whispering again "It's ok ..." and "I hold you ..." and "I'm here ..." and Santana's arms shifted onto Brittany's shoulders and Santana tighten her hiding her face in her neck and whispering "Thank you ..." on her skin because now she really felt it.

Santana, for the first time since she had arrived, had lost the time, she didn't realize how much time had passed resting on that warm body. But when she looked up and peered into the room from above Brittany's shoulders, she no more was sobbing and although her eyesight was watery she saw all the others watching her, watching that embrace. They didn't talk, but her father moved frantically his right foot crossed on his left leg and her mother had one arm tight to her waist and the fist of the other hand pressed to her lips and Quinn kept her eyes on the ground, shaking her head and Karen was still leaning against the wall with narrowed eyes and tight lips and Rachel and Kurt had their head tilted and their eyes wide open, and glossy. She recognized every expression on their faces. Just Finn was missing but soon she felt him move beside her and Santana closed her eyes and pulled away from Brittany who left her without any resistance. Brittany had red cheeks and wet eyes and she was wiping the tears that had fallen on her cheeks and Santana smiled at her because she looked still like a little girl when she cried and she was so sweet. When Brittany smiled back at her Santana, however, took away her smile and looked away because she had to regain control and not lose it at all. But she felt Brittany's fingers brush against hers and close on her hand and before she could react Brittany said to her softly "Let's go."

"Where?" Santana asked confused. Where she wanted to take her? Why?

"I'll take you to her." Brittany said, and pulled her gently making her move. Then Brittany grabbed Finn's hand too who instead refused her hand and encircled Brittany with one arm and together they walked down the hallway.

* * *

A/N Thank you all for reading. A really really special thank to lg4az!


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